This is why an editor's total fee differs among projects. In a corner of my office, on the wall, I have these editing speeds (number of 250-word manuscript pages per hour) posted from years ago when I worked on a lot of fiction manuscripts for mass-market paperbacks*:
Really messy mss.: 9 pp./h
Average mss.: 12–17 pp./h
Easy juvenile mss.: 19 pp./h
Average mss.: 12–17 pp./h
Easy juvenile mss.: 19 pp./h
The bulk of the editing I do today is of manuscripts for biomedical journals, written by non-native speakers of English. My general editing speed for those:
2 pp./h
And of course each editor's speed is different, and a lot depends on how much work the manuscript needs, whatever the genre.
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*Printed dimensions: usually 6.75" × 4.25".
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2 comments:
I am also an editor of biomedical manuscripts (and grant proposals, posters, slides, etc.) for non-native speakers of English, and I was feeling very, very slow reading your messy/average/easy speeds... Then I got to "2 pp./h" and thought,"Aaah, yes! That's more like it!". At least, on a good day with a not-so-messy manuscript! :)
I'm glad I could provide confirmation, Bethanie. And it's always nice to hear from another medical editor.
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