The graceful writing, the clean editing, and the backbone of truthful reporting allow me to read without fear of encountering typos and grammatical foul play. (Though they also make every Seymour Hersh article about the Middle East extra-depressing, because it's all true.)
So when The Boy said to me last week, "I think I found an error in The New Yorker," (and yes, he said the title in italics, because that's how we work at CGHQ) my heart sank. How could such a thing happen?
It was in the April 7 Financial Page column:
(I'm doing this slowly, because it's so painful. Okay, here goes):
But is it an error? First glance suggests there's a preposition missing from the second sentence: it should read "That will probably mean that we end up with fewer business failures ..."
But this being The New Yorker, which doesn't let me down ever ever (right?), I'm willing to believe (read: hope) that the meaning of the sentence is "That means we, as a society, can self-identify as failures on fewer occasions."
Copyeditor General's ruling: What do you think? Does the sentence make sense without the preposition, or is this a test of my faith in the infallibility of my editorial role model?
