The Guardian newspaper had, for a long time, a reputation for misprints – hence its nickname, The Grauniad. You don’t hear that so often nowadays, except in ‘Private Eye’, which amuses its readers (or is it just its own writers?) with many such ‘adapted’ names, such as Piers Moron, Jeffrey Archhole and the Guardian’s one-time rival paper, ‘The Indescribablyboring’.
But the joke has been going a long time and I think its time has passed – not least because it now has a ‘Corrections and Clarifications’ column, drawing attention to mistakes pointed out by readers so that inaccuracies are put right.
The same can’t be said of many well-known publishers. Write to The Guardian to tell them, say, that a recipe didn’t specify when to peel the avocado (oh, so Guardian!), and your correction is likely to appear in print; they do this even if the correction a minor one, or tangential to the point being made. The kind of correction that, in Private Eye, would appear in ‘Pedantry Corner’ – the part of the letters page where readers compete to make obscure and irrelevant corrections.
Whereas if you write to a publisher to point out a mistake in a book, you won’t even get a reply. No matter that they are a prestigious brand. No matter that the mistake is a significant one. No matter that the book’s profile is high enough to make it at least possible that it will be reprinted.
The irony is that the publisher has made a worse and a more lasting mistake.
Worse, because while the Guardian had a matter of hours to get a few hundred thousand newspapers out of the print works and all round the country, the publisher has had several months to proofread, copy edit and check. They ought to be far more likely to spot a mistake.
More lasting, because while yesterday’s Guardian will line your rabbit hutch and then disappear forever, the mistake in the £12.99 book you bought is going to be on your shelf for years.
So I propose we ditch the outdated nickname, for the newspaper that now prides itself on putting things right. And I suggest that publishers take seriously the notion that you can make less mistakes if you acknowledge it when they are pointed out.
Accuracy Works 