Cleaning up the Quote: Wash Post Ombudsman faults ex-Reporter Howard Bryant

[imjustagirl2]

So someone actually drops "mofo" and "ship" in all your quotes? Every single one of them? Because I see great usable quotes on TV every single freaking day.

 

[Mizzougrad96]

So someone actually drops "mofo" and "ship" in all your quotes? Every single one of them? Because I see great usable quotes on TV every single freaking day.

Again, it completely depends... The best quotes we get usually come when the TV cameras aren't around...

 

[imjustagirl2]

Well I'm sorry if those are your best quotes.

There have been plenty of times when I've gotten a great quote at its core, but I just couldn't make it work. So I didn't use it. I'm not willing to change a quote just because it's catchy.

 

[SixToe]

We don't want to get in the habit of changing quotes, but sometimes we have to translate.

Then paraphrase.

Sometimes I wish we did print every single "uh," "ah," "y'know" and "mos' defnitlee" along with some of the stupid things coaches actually say.

 

[Lugnuts]

When Bryant changed 'doing' in the real quote to 'going through'... That's where he truly went too far.

I'm with Frank and IJAG. Why not write it this way:

Portis said he doesn't know what anyone else feels, thinks or does, and that "the only thing I know is what's going on in Clinton Portis's life."

Maybe it doesn't have the same flair, but it's real, and you still get Portis using himself in the 3rd person a la Rickey.

 

[imjustagirl2]

I love that, Lugs. I'm not usually keen on partial quotes (one of our writers WAY overuses them) but in that case, it works perfectly.

 

[ballscribe]

Exactly. He didn't just clean up, he changed it.

Had he changed

"I don't know how nobody feel, I don't know what nobody think, I don't know what nobody doing, the only thing I know is what's going on in Clinton Portis's life," to

"I don't know how nobody feels, I don't know what nobody thinks, I don't know what nobody's doing, ....

he could have cleaned it up while still keeping the sense of the thing.

 

[Lugnuts]

Thanks, IJAG!

 

[Mizzougrad96]

When Bryant changed 'doing' in the real quote to 'going through'... That's where he truly went too far.

I'm with Frank and IJAG. Why not write it this way:

Portis said he doesn't know what anyone else feels, thinks or does, and that "the only thing I know is what's going on in Clinton Portis's life."

Maybe it doesn't have the same flair, but it's real, and you still get Portis using himself in the 3rd person a la Rickey.

I would agree with that...

 

[Fenian_Bastard]

Don't edit quotes for grammatical purposes. For whatever reason, but especially not for those given by Howard.
Period.
End of forking story.

 

[Mizzougrad96]

Don't edit quotes for grammatical purposes. For whatever reason, but especially not for those given by Howard.
Period.
End of forking story.

You know it's not that simple... We would like to think it is, but it's not...

 

[Some Guy]

This is actually an interesting discussion. Here's something else. Some of us don't use tape recorders, at least not all the time. I will use one on a feature or mid-week story that I'm going to have plenty of time to write.

I don't often use one while writing a gamer on deadline.

And I can tell you, for a fact, that by simply taking notes in shorthand on a notepad, I've failed to quote people verbatim on numerous occasions.

I've never, to my knowledge, got something just flat wrong. But I'm sure I've turned in quotes that would have violated the Post's policy.

So, should I be fired, I wonder?

Of course, on the occasions I have used a recorder, I've noticed that many of the quotes the SID staff provides on the quote sheet wouldn't past muster with the WaPo either.