[Third revision in progress]
I’m rereading Robert Caro’s Means of Ascent, the second volume of his biography of Lyndon Johnson. People who don’t know his work groan when told how long his books are — the four volumes published so far total over 3000 pages; the world has eagerly been waiting for the fifth and final volume for over a decade. The length of his books miss the larger point — The Power Broker, for which he won his first (of two) Pulitzer Prizes, is 1336 pages — they are so well-edited that they can’t be compared to the average long book, and reading them is more like riding along a pleasant current while on an interesting adventure, compared to the usual tepidly edited experience, which is more akin to fighting headwinds of imprecise expressions, and taking detours of varying banality — without knowing where you are going, or why you even care.
The legendary Robert Gottlieb, sadly recently deceased, was apparently the Michael Jordan of editors, so it’s not entirely fair to compare Caro’s books with those edited by lesser mortals. Caro and Gottlieb structure their collaborative volumes with an essential impulse — outside of the basic story, they declare a higher purpose (in this case, an analysis of the dynamics of political power), but also they continue to hook you, like Scheherazade, with periodic puzzles which drives you forward into the narrative.
Means of Ascent begins in March 1965 (the same month as the Selma protest marches) with Lyndon Johnson, who as a Congressman from Texas, voted down every piece of civil rights legislation for his entire 12 year career in the House of Representatives — now, as President, submitting what would become the Voting Rights Act of 1965, he introduced it with an impassioned plea that the cause of Black Americans must be a cause for all Americans — and ended his speech with a spectacularly timed ad lib: “And we shall overcome!” — thereby co-opting the anthem of the movement.
Despite the usual opposition from Southern conservatives, Johnson’s power base, the Voting Rights Act came into law on August 6th, 1965.
In his ascent from the House of Representatives to the Presidency, Lyndon Johnson did some very questionable things. But those highly questionable ‘means’ must be examined within the context of some honorable ‘ends.’ And thus Caro introduces the sordid topic of how LBJ stole the Democratic primary from one of Texas’ best-loved politicians, the Cowboy Governor, Coke Stevenson, by 87 infamous votes — and why that mattered greatly to the civil rights of Southern Americans.
Life editing
That was my (poorly edited) way of introducing the topic of life editing — but it is merely one example of why editing, essentially a “hidden” discipline, can be so impactful. Rather than describing Johnson’s life in chronological order, Caro gives the reader the dramatic context that drives the story, weaving together the overt warp threads with the more subtle weft ones, resulting in a complex fabric with essential texture and dimensionality.
In some ways the goal of a biographer of a public persona is to de-edit — read everything, in order to venture past the carefully chiseled narratives, add back the hidden and sometimes unsavory episodes to show primal forces and motivations, shortcuts and dead-ends — to reach an asymptotic characterization of a fellow human — fame, faults, and all.
We all naturally edit our own narratives, what we share with people — how we characterize leaving our last job, how much we like our current job, how good a golfer we are — why we (correctly) made the decisions we made.
Facebook and Instagram are useful forms to observe individual editing — for the most part, we share information on those platforms in order to induce a certain image in our audience — we characterize our lives by what we show but also by what we do not show, often resulting in a large gap between the external image and our actual reality. And with a constant feedback loop (likes and comments), I suppose the editing of external functions can become actively influenced by the audience, rather than purely a function of what the principal unilaterally intends to share. But feedback is often essential to the editing process.
I haven’t posted anything since 2018, but when I did, I remember thinking that the question of “what should I share” was a puzzling one — I specifically curated my feed to lend an aura of multi-dimensionality — I’ve always aspired to a polymathic lifestyle, and shied away from being pigeon-holed. I suppose that impulse was partly a reaction to the surfeit of unidimensional feeds — “look at my FABulous lifestyle” / “check out the cool people I hang out with” / “these are the amazing wines I’m drinking.” I’ve sometimes wondered whether a psychologist could look at someone’s feed and accurately derive their entire value system from just the posts on their feed.
My indirect solution to the modern trend of sharing has actually been this Substack — rather than show random photos of meals (OK, I have included one or two) I’ve eaten or places I’ve been, I periodically write up a topic which interests me and hopefully entertains readers — but the compositional process is alternately digital and analog: pre-composition, I keep a digital list of topics I might want to write about (currently 177 items long, having written about or deleted 186 of them), then sometimes I scribble on a steno pad the variety of thoughts that come to mind about that topic. For actual composition, I use an iPad (with a Keychron mechanical keyboard) and simply stream ideas to the page without too much regard for tightness or structure. When a reasonable draft is complete, I subsequently print it out on paper, and edit it severely with a fountain pen, as if someone else wrote it; the pages brimming with excisions, rewrites, and addenda. Then I revise, and repeat.
Creating tension and drama
Since long before Homer, humans have been attuned to remembering stories rather than streams of data. And while we all tell stories, some people are far better at it than others — over time, the good ones have edited the story for maximum effect — which sometimes results in exaggeration of the basic facts, but could also include serifs like impersonation for comic effect.
Gifted story tellers are rare, and therefore memorable. I probably tell stories better on the page than in person, likely because the editing is far better. Robert Caro notes how Lyndon Johnson was a charismatic teller of ‘stories’ — he edited them as he retold them, sometimes to improbable lengths, in order to seduce the sympathy of his audience.
In the professional storytelling world, I’ve dabbled around the edges of the entertainment business long enough to realize that I should leave that business to the experts. The ability to craft compelling stories is indeed high art — the process of developing dramatic tension and driving towards a resolution requires subtlety and a deft touch.
Within that world, however, documentaries are often dull — reflecting the unbounded enthusiasm of the doc maker for their subject, the editing is often insufficient and there is little drama (because it is assumed the topic is of equal interest for everyone), just the same petrified horse getting beaten repeatedly. Recent trends have raised the level of docs — many are more severely edited for dramatic tension. In the past, viewing docs in a movie theater generally meant they needed to be at least feature length (90 min); in the streaming era, the story can be more tightly edited because the requirement of a minimum running time has been lifted.
Editing in Hollywood
An Oscar is awarded for Best Film Editing, but it’s not one of the ‘majors’ even if it’s worthy of an award. Few non-industry people could name a famous editor (which goes for book publishing as well). Thelma Schoonmaker is the most nominated editor (9 times, won 3), having worked with Martin Scorcese since Raging Bull (that her editing of Goodfellas in 1991 lost to a three hour Dances with Wolves is hard to believe) – and yet she is probably anonymous to all but a few film cognoscenti.
There are a variety of rules of thumb about post production (how you compose the film once the production process is finished), one of them suggests one hour to 1 minute of screen time, but that can vary widely. Here is a behind the scenes look at the (modern = digital) editing process, for Everything Everywhere All at Once – which should impart some sympathy for how complex the editing process is, and the boundless versions of any film which are possible. Any one who has sat in on the film editing process tends to be amazed at the micro-level of detail, as well as the sheer amount of processing necessary — given the mountains of footage from the dailies, and the infinite ways to cut the stuffed catalog of video and audio snippets into a coherent story. When the process was analog, there were probably slightly fewer possibilities (because of the physical limitations of film), but the process itself (splicing!) must have been far more arduous.
Once a film is released, the audience thinks of the film as a singular work, but those involved in production know that it could have had a wide variety of versions. Although there is particular focus on the endings, the entire movie could be cut to generate a different feel, and in some rare cases the director decides that the studio ruined the original vision and the film is recut – the “director’s cut” – as opposed to the version made by the studio’s suits). There are a variety of famous film re-cuts.
Editing is a metier, but since it is a derivative metier (like translation, or interpretation), it doesn’t have quite the same cachet or gravitas as a principal function; our biases are trained to focus on the raw genius, rather than the cool heads (in the background) that can bring that unorganized and often incomprehensible ‘vision’ to some measure of public digestibility. If unadulterated brilliance bubbles up without any proper editing, we end up with the current version of Kanye West (now just the wild and wacky Ye).
What makes a good editor
A poor editing job can sometimes detract from the content, like the current controversy about the Princess of Wales apologizing for dabbling with Photoshop to ‘prove’ she is out and about (despite leaves on the trees which suggest the photo isn’t current). Properly done, editing should be invisible and coherent, but like the culinary dimension of umami, bring elements together into a harmonic whole.
Like the master cutter who transforms a rough diamond into a multi-faceted explosion of light beams, editors have to be ruthlessly focused on the output function, and the effect of that output on the audience, given previous experience. While the author is dialed into his or her vision, the editor is essentially match-making that vision with knowledge of the audience, an area where they usually have far greater knowledge than the creator, without being blinded by the artistic ‘vision.’
At the same time, the editor needs to be highly sympathetic and collaborative — no creator wants to work with someone who will disregard the original intention, hijacking the vision to chase some dubious pursuit of audience palatability (the gratuitous sex scenes in Game of Thrones?). There needs to be patience and open mindedness, and a high degree of trust from both sides.
I like the idea of an editor as a ‘ruthless collaborator.’
Editors are focused on higher order goals, something I touched upon in #110: In Praise of Meta-Levels. They need to have a strong awareness of the end goal(s), creating a degree of logical order from the fundamental threads of creative enterprise. Their objective should not be to stifle creativity in favor of some rigid set of protocols, although this can happen (the procedural drama on TV, for instance) — it is to strike a balance between the creative impulse, a logical coherence, and a compelling aesthetic.
Feedback is essential for the editing process, since its objectives are to bridge a piece of content and an audience — it is critical to change the point of view from the author to the audience, and groove with the audience at some level (like the best DJs). Sometimes this essential feedback comes from other editors — probably the fastest way to learn; but there are a wide range of methods to get feedback. The important idea is that feedback is essential to good editing.
I was singing in the shower recently, and it dawned on me that the echo effect in the shower is a strong feedback loop — it enables us to find the proper pitch far easier than when we sing without an echo. For the same reason, most professional musicians use in-ear monitors to isolate their musical track back to them, so they can remain firmly on key (or whatever they intend).
Applications to daily life
The timidly offered point of this piece is the idea that the editing process has much to inform our daily lives. Looking at some of our daily activities through the lens of an editor might change our perspective for the better, or at worst, provide a few minor insights. Below I offer a few areas where I found the editing overlay somewhat insightful.
Editing what we own: declutterization
Marie Kondo teaches editing skills, essentially. I’m in the process of packing up my Los Angeles apartment (for a move to Hong Kong), and it is clear that the ability to obtain nearly anything on Amazon is both great (short run) and terrible (long run). The process of moving is a necessary life edit for our possessions — do I really want to move this item which I haven’t used in ages — does it still give me joy? Is that really the benchmark? Or has the Everything Store enabled me to become weighed down by the cornucopia of non-essential possessions?
Editing what we do: scheduling
This is a sore topic for many people, therefore a practical area where some advice might result in efficiency improvement, from the point of view of life goals and general happiness, not necessarily the dubious achievement of being busy all the time.
For people working full-time, most schedules I’ve seen are passive — empty spaces into which requests come and are generally accepted if there is no existing conflict. What I do not see (and I do not do this enough myself), is some form of active time management, where the principal decides how much time to spend on various work and life sub-goals, and then fits appropriate tasks and appointments into those prioritized time buckets. In particular, there is little thought for personal time whatsoever — the typical executive schedule tends to be back-to-back, as if that was the proven way to be most effective (hint: it’s not).
Easy edits:
Marginal meetings: For full schedules, there are low value meetings which should be excised; there should be a minimum standard of ‘value add’ to insert anything into the schedule. Exceptions can be made, but they should be clearly noted as exceptions.
Preparation time: too often is preparation time given short shrift — generally it is not even scheduled, just a nebulous amount of time which needs to be guarded, but it is hardly ever actively present in someone’s schedule, resulting in constant prep anxiety.
Personal reflection time: we are not contextless creators. We need to familiarize ourselves with world events, rising stars, flaming disappointments, etc. Reading the news, listening to podcasts, scanning the infinite abyss of social media or short video, chatting and brainstorming with colleagues — all of these functions are necessary to create the mental sugars that our brain yeasts can feed on to produce the wildly exciting ideas which propel our careers and reputation. This can be taken too far, of course, given their somewhat addictive nature, which is why scheduling them for a finite amount of time can be useful.
Coaches are a kind of life / career editor — they usually take a meta-level view, and offer suggestions from the perspective of desired outcomes. A comprehensive edit / audit would be working backwards from goals — given a certain set of life goals, measuring time and effort spent in those domains, compared to their appropriate time priority. It would be useful to have an AI look at your historical schedule (and at some point, your Google location, or even your online presence) and present an analysis of how you spent your time broken down by category — I’m sure it would make for useful insights about whether you were spending time in sync with your professed goals, or whether you routinely plunge into the YouTube/TikTok abyss. Most mobile operating systems have Digital Wellbeing monitors for time spent in that ecosystem, but even those are generally too depressing to open.
Editing what we wear: personal style
A number of my friends, some but not all of whom have spent time in the fashion businesses, have terrific personal style — effortlessly elegant, they are always dialed into any situation; nothing in excess, just a natural individual balance. Generally, they eschew obvious brand names; their brand is defined by how they compose — edit — their looks.
That is not, as most of my friends know, my forte. I bumble along, skimming along the averages, taking few risks, but occasionally going overboard with a specific item I’ve unfortunately favorited. I suppose I’ve never had a good external editor in this dimension — perhaps it is something I should consider.
Perhaps because I’m fashion-disabled, I think some people try too hard — the OOTD influencers, for example; their style defines them rather than the other way around, they obsess over every last detail. But maybe it’s just sour grapes on my end; they probably view it as their metier (now, or in the future). And I do love movies like The Devil Wears Prada and Cruella — though in both movies I think it’s the dramatic transformation that appeals to me the most, more than the fashion itself.
Editing what we eat: culinary arts
Editing is about choices — so at some level chefs (and anyone preparing food) are meal editors, determining how to process various raw ingredients, balancing taste and texture, cutting out excess and detractive elements. Nutritionally speaking, we could take the raw materials, throw them in a blender, and whip up a dinner smoothie but it would probably result in something repulsively green/brown and which stimulated not our salivary glands but our gag reflex. Thoughtful harmonic combinations of foods, artfully processed and combined, does much for our enjoyment of the basic process of consuming food to obtain energy for survival.
As a related aside, I’ve always been enamored of the idea that so many of our favorite foods are essentially pre-processed by fungi and bacteria: bread, cheese and yogurt, wine and whiskey, kimchi and sauerkraut— to say nothing of fish sauce and kombucha. Even the aging of prime steaks and sushi grade fish is actually a bacterial deterioration process (but ‘aging’ sounds more delicious). Over time, humans have figured out optimal ways for having bacteria pre-digest food for us, editing our ingestibles at a microscopic level, preparing our morsels for our delicate palates and gastrointestinal biome all at once.
These little buggers add the fluffy bubbles to our bread, the relaxing alcohol to our beer, and the funky aromas to our cheese — they generally consume sugars / starches and add complexity and fun. We can’t see them, but we enjoy how they make what we eat more delicious.
Editing what we communicate
There is a spectrum of communication tiers, which I discussed in #123: Lazy communication, from live conversation to publications and artistic works. There is often a slight time delay for live (broadcast) conversation which enables on-the-fly editing, preventing the inadvertent F-bomb or unsanitary expression, but the delay can be rather awkward for the speakers. There is, as I’ve recounted, something magical about those improvisational conversationalists who can have highly developed real time editing functions, so often with a bon mot, or the seemingly laser-guided barb (hint: they probably do more preparation than most).
Media training, for those who appear live on leveraged platforms like networks, is essentially imparting a rudimentary editing module into the speaker, and hoping that they can remember those rules in the heat of the fire. In my limited experience, it can be confusing to have to run meta-level editing protocols while you’re trying to talk normally, but like anything, you get used to it (or make enough mistakes that you aren’t asked back).
No editing can be good: journals are boring but useful
I have kept a journal since I was 14, starting with a one year diary with a page for each day, and growing to countless looseleaf notebooks and thousands of pages. For the most part, they’re exceedingly boring to read, even for the person who wrote them — because journals, like other linear chronologies, are largely unedited. Of course there is some editing, in the composition process, it’s not like a 24/7 livestream. One tends to write only the things that are concerning at the moment, so there is much repetition and fluff in journals, where the value is the therapeutic process of evacuating one’s inner angst and feelings, without much regard for who might read it in the future — the output process is the primary objective of journaling, less so the consumption process, so less editing is probably more effective.
The first thing one notices about rereading a personal journal is simply how terrible our memories are — or is it just me? As we have told and retold stories, like Lyndon Johnson, embellishing them as we go, they can drift very far from their source, to the point where they can become completely unrecognizable. Journal entries bring us back to earth, grounding our stories (for ourselves, at least), and exposing our faulty memories in black and white.
That does not mean they aren’t entertaining to read — even though they are quite boring on the whole, they contain periodic nuggets of tremendous importance, but these must be sifted from the mass of repetitive drivel, like a few ounces of gold from tons of crushed ore. This suggests that abridged (edited) journals should be far more entertaining; collections of personal letters are probably similar.
In addition to the periodic nuggets, another useful dimension of a journal is that they are a contemporary account — they are histories written without knowing what will happen in the future, something which is usually overlooked in the day and age of rigorous editing from an omniscient ex-post vantage point. I often recommend the book Defying Hitler by Sebastian Haffner, an account of a Viennese intellectual during the rise of Hitler, as a rare example of contemporary history, and therefore illuminating the difficulty of the “stay or go” decision without the benefit of knowing what will happen. Known outcomes often change preferred narratives dramatically.
Final notes
Maybe it’s paradoxical that my longest piece so far is about why applying an editing process can help our overall efficiency. I did three four full edits of the draft, in my partial defense.
Editing is a hidden process — well-edited books and films are demonstrably more satisfying and pleasurable than hack jobs with nuggets of promise — superb editing doesn’t announce itself. There are many dimensions to editing: what to include, what to leave out, how to combine and sequence elements in a coherent manner, and even about how to manage (beat) the timing of those elements, among many others.
And yet this process is applicable in so many other areas, from the way we spend our time and the junk we accumulate, to the people we socialize with, to what we decide to eat. The sad fact is that we don’t give much active thought to the editing process — few of us were ever trained to do it in any domain, and none of us were trained to apply it to life in general. Maybe that’s an oversight, in a world where people are often searching for aesthetics, balance, and meaning.