Is it possible for one to be a good editor but a bad writer or vice versa?

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I'm talking in a purely theoretical manner: what will I say is not backed up by direct experience

Well, in theory, the skillsets you need to be a good editor and a good writer don't overlap completely.

A good writer may be able to set up interesting stories, compelling characters, and amazing plot arcs. But it doesn't necessary knows precisely what he's doing; all the more so if he's made an habit out of writing. He may know what works and what doesn't instinctively, but doesn't always mean he can put that knowledge into words - hence being able to give relevant suggestions to others.

Also, a writer skillset may be limited to the genre he's used to write, to his particular style and vocabulary, and to the books he uses to read most, and so on. While editors may specialize as well on a given genre, they need at least to be more flexible and deal with different PoVs, narration styles, story paces and so on.

So, a good writer could be a bad editor because he doesn't know how to give relevant suggestions to another writer, either because he can't express them, or maybe because he can't "bend" his style to match the fellow writer style.

Conversely, a good editor may have all the skills needed to take a raw story and polish it out until perfection (or guide the writer to do so). But doesn't necessarily mean that he has the ideas and the drive to write one himself. Putting words on page is actually different from editing those same words, a little bit how knowing how a cake is made (the ingredients and the cooking process) is actually different from baking the actual cake.

A good editor could be a bad writer just because he doesn't manage to be a writer (not completing a story, for example) or because he lacks some extent of creativity, and his stories feel like a run-of-the-mill plot, with stereotypical characters and what else.

posted about 6 years ago

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