With apologies to Gilbert & Sullivan . . .
Here is the sole surviving song from The Edits of Freelance, a legendary operetta about a band of jovial, impecunious, beer-swilling copyeditors living off the New English coast. The rest of the script sank with all hands during an ill-advised and possibly inebriated attempt to walk across Vineyard Sound on Fireworks Night.
For those unfamiliar with the show: Young Frederika’s parents are highly placed in the Halliburton World Government, but Frederika has nothing but contempt for their conspicuously consumptive lifestyle and so runs off to join the Freelancers. After much waving of weapons and paying of bribes, a detachment of lawyers, accountants, and transportation security screeners have found Frederika and persuaded her to meet with her parents on the privately owned and heavily fortified island of Gnoshon. Frederika is reluctant, but the Lawyer Chief has warned her that the Halliburtonian Triumvirs know that the Freelancers possess pencils of mass destruction and are prepared to act accordingly. The Editor Queen and her Editorial Associates bid Frederika a rousing farewell with this song.
CHORUS
Editor Queen:
For I am the Editor Queen!
Associates:
You are! Hurrah for the Editor Queen!
Editor Queen:
And it is, it is a glorious thing to be an Editor Queen!
Associates:
It is! Hurrah for the Editor Queen, hurrah for the . . .
Editor Queen:
Oh, better far to just get by
editing books with standards high
than take some far more lucrative work
polishing crap for some rich jerk!
Away to the corporate world go you
where words are false and no one’s true
But I’ll be true to the song I sing
and manage to thrive as an editor queen!
CHORUS
Associates:
For she is the Editor Queen!
She is! Hurrah for the Editor Queen!
Editor Queen:
And it is, it is a glorious thing to be an Editor Queen!
Associates:
Hurrah for the Editor Queen, hurrah for the Editor Queen!
Editor Queen:
When I sit me down to pummel some prose
I smack my lips and I hold my nose
I shred a few more sentences, true,
than a novice editor ought to do
But many a pro at a top trade press
to make a book from an awful mess
must manage somehow to slog through
more gobbledygook than ever I do.
CHORUS
Associates:
For she is the Editor Queen!
She is! Hurrah for the Editor Queen!
Editor Queen:
And it is, it is a glorious thing to be an Editor Queen!
Associates:
Hurrah for the Editor Queen, hurrah for the Editor Queen!
Repeat CHORUS as Frederika climbs into the waiting dinghy and the Associates shower her with Post-it notes.
Possible rescue on the horizon?
Write Through It 
Loved it!
I must brush up my Gilbert and Sullivan so I can sing it too! Maybe you should do a performance at the editor’s conference in Toronto next year.
Isobel Stevenson
LikeLike
Maybe I should do some salvage work in Vineyard Sound and see if I can dredge up the rest of the script, or at least some more remnants. 🙂
LikeLike
G and S is usually sung with so much gusto and quick enunciation that it would be a challenge to actually sing your lyrics. They are humorous though!
LikeLike
Did you actually try singing it? This isn’t “I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General”! 😉 The only phrase I have a little trouble with is “manage to thrive.” Maybe I will tweak it.
LikeLike