How many of my manuscript’s 600+ em dashes did my copy editor cut?
The manuscript I gave my copy editor contained more than 600 em dashes. He flagged a bunch. However, only two were for outright removal. Another 20-plus were to be replaced mostly with ellipses, as well as a few commas.
I made all the suggested changes, and even removed or replaced a few more here and there, as I really was misusing them in places.
At the same time, he suggested adding two more—and along the way I added another five.
The continuing backlash against em dashes
I get it: No writer wants their book or article or even social post to look like it was written by AI.
However, the idea that em dash use is a marker to AI use is farcical to me. You know what AI copy also uses a lot of? Commas. And periods. I’m not going to stop using those punctuation marks either.
So, on the question of “Is the em dash still a worthy punctuation mark, or has chatbot output devalued it?” I agree with The New York Times (gift article link) that the em dash is “the people’s punctuation mark.” Now and forever.
Long live em dashes!
(But also, how about those ellipses? We’re not giving them enough credit.)
Related posts:
The mistakes my copy editor caught
My sci-fi novel is now in the hands of my copy editor
To get future posts…
