Favorite Quotes on Indexing
Dr. Samuel Austin Allibon,
Critical Dictionary of Authors: "We know that in the construction
of a
good index, there is far more scope for the exercise of judgment and abilities
than is
commonly supposed. We feel the merits of the compiler of such an
index, and we are very
ready to testify our thankfulness for his
exertions."
Pat F. Boone, INDEXING: The Manual
of Good Practice, page 377:
"We can suppose that, even if electronic
chips carrying immense libraries were implanted
in the brains of humans,
indexers' intellectual skills would still be needed at the preparation
stage
in order to make the information retrievable."
Chicago Manual of Style, 14th edition: "Less time is
available for the preparation of an index
than for almost any other step in
the bookmaking process. For obvious reasons, most indexes
cannot be completed
until page proofs are available. Typesetters are anxious for those few
final
pages of copy; printers want to get the job on the press; binders are waiting;
salesmen
are clamoring for finished books. Surely you can get that index done
over the weekend?"
Chicago Manual of Style, 13th edition: "The
indexing of complex and involved subjects
requires a thorough knowledge of
the subject."
Alec Clifton-Taylor, ".An Open Letter to a
Publisher: Few authors, I suspect, are tempera-
mentally capable of
making their own index.
E.J. Crane and Charles L. Bernier, Indexing
and Index-Searching: "The place to begin
looking in an index is under the
heading coming first to mind."
Peter Farrell, "How to
Make Money from Home: "Indexing work is not recommended to
those who
lack an orderly mind and a capacity for taking pains. A good index is a
minor
work of art but it is also the product of clear thought and meticulous
care."
Lorena Garloch: "Books with no indexes are all apparently written
or published by egotists."
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784): "Let me hear no
more of him, Sir. That is the fellow
who made the Index to my
RAMBLERS and set down the name of Milton thus:
Milton, Mr. John
Lori Lathrop, Key Words, vol t, no. 3, (May/June 1998), p. 26: "If you're an artist,
you don't create a masterpiece by starting on one side of the canvas and painting linearly
to the other side. You don't start at the top of the canvas and paint 'til you reach the bottom.
Rather, you develop the masterpiece in bits and pieces at a time; then you stand back, get a
broader perspective, and start to pull it all together. Indexing is like that, too."
Stephen Leacock: "A really good index will in
most cases itself give the information wanted."
The London Times, 8 May
1957: "The inclusion of an index is, of course, not enough in
itself. It must
be a good index."
Nancy Mulvany, Indexing Books: "Indexing cannot
be reduced to a set of steps that can
be followed! It is not a mechanical
process. Indexing books is a form of writing. Like
other types of writing, it
is a mixture of art and craft, judgment and selection. With practice
and
experience, indexers develop their own style as do other writers. The best we
can do
as teachers is to present the rules and offer guidance."
The Rt. Hon. Harold Macmillan: "I know, too, how often an author, whether
he knows it
or not, was indebted to an indexer for pointing out errors, discrepancies,
or repititions that
had otherwise escaped detection in the
proofs."
Elizabeth Pickard, a Registered Indexer and member of the
Society of Indexers (SI),
at the 2001 Society of Indexers Conference in
Sheffield, England, in cautioning
new indexers to avoid large projects until
they acquire more experience and expertise:
"...800 pages is not the
same as 4 x 200 pages."
John Ruskin: "It is easy enough to make an index,
as it is to make a broom of odds and ends,
as rough as oat straw; but to make
an index tied up tight, and that will seep well into the
corners, isn't so
easy."
William Shakespeare: "Ah me, what act that roars so loud and
thunders in the index?"
Jed H. Taylor, Books with no indexes: "A
poor index perpetuates a kind of literary fraud."
S.I. Wicklen: "The
index is regarded by the publisher as an afterthought and the printer as a
nuisance."
Indexing Services 
Indexing
Workshops
