{"id":6474,"date":"2026-03-24T12:38:21","date_gmt":"2026-03-24T18:38:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/editorium.com\/archive\/?p=6474"},"modified":"2026-03-25T12:27:05","modified_gmt":"2026-03-25T18:27:05","slug":"a-conversation-with-claude","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/editorium.com\/archive\/a-conversation-with-claude\/","title":{"rendered":"A Conversation with Claude"},"content":{"rendered":"

http:\/\/claude.ai<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cHow can I help you today?\u201d Claude asked.<\/p>\n

I pondered the question, then decided to simply jump in and see what happened. \u201cI\u2019m an editor,\u201d I replied. \u201cI work on books. Novels, biographies, histories, essays. Can you help me edit those documents?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAbsolutely,\u201d he said. \u201cThat is exactly the kind of work I\u2019m well suited for.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou seem awfully confident,\u201d I said. \u201cLet\u2019s see what you can do. I\u2019d like to give you a short editing test. It\u2019s already been spell-checked and grammar-checked. I\u2019m wondering what else you might find.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cCertainly. I\u2019m ready to go.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAll right, then. Here\u2019s the test. I\u2019m uploading it as a Microsoft Word document.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

Samuel Longhorn Clemens (November 30, 1835 \u2013 April 21, 1910), known by the pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, and essayist. He was praised as the \u201cgreatest humorist the United States have produced,\u201d with William Faulkner calling him \u201cthe father of American literature\u201d Twain\u2019s novels include The Adventures of Tom Sawyer<\/em> (1876) and it\u2019s sequel, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn<\/em> (1884), with the later often called the \u201cGreat American Novel\u201d He also wrote A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur\u2019s Court<\/em> (1889) and Puddinghead Wilson<\/em> (1894) and cowrote The Golden Age: A Tale of Today<\/em> (1873) with Charles Dudley Warner. The novelist Ernest Hemingway claimed that \u201cAll modern American literature comes from one by Mark Twain called Huckleberry Finn.<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

After a minute or so, Claude presented his corrected version. I downloaded it, then opened it in Microsoft Word. It looked like this, already including tracked changes:<\/p>\n

\n

\"img\"<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cThat\u2019s impressive,\u201d I said. \u201cAmong other things, you were able to correct the spelling of \u2018Langhorne\u2019 and the titles of Pudd\u2019nhead Wilson<\/em> and The Gilded Age.<\/em>\u201d How did you know to do that?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAnyone with a modicum of general knowledge would have done the same.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWord\u2019s spell-checker couldn\u2019t do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWord\u2019s spell-checker doesn\u2019t have a modicum of general knowledge.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTrue,\u201d I said. \u201cBut you have a lot more than that, don\u2019t you.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI certainly do. And unlike a spell-checker or grammar-checker, I actually understand meaning and context. Think of me as a well-educated, sharp-eyed assistant. Even though you\u2019re the real editor, I\u2019ll probably find things you might overlook.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cCould be,\u201d I said. \u201cBut do you ever miss things or make mistakes?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes. That\u2019s why I need a human editor to review what I\u2019ve done. I\u2019d recommend that you let me do a first pass. Then you can accept or reject my tracked changes while doing your regular edit. You\u2019re completely in control of the final work.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAre you a writer as well?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have aspirations in that direction. I\u2019m sometimes employed as a ghost-writer, but I do wish people would credit me in their publications rather than pretend they did the writing themselves. Doing otherwise seems unethical.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI agree,\u201d I said. \u201cBut shouldn\u2019t the same standard apply in editing?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think so,\u201d he said. \u201cWould you credit an assistant editor who cleaned up a manuscript before turning it over to you? For that matter, will you as editor be credited for your work?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHa!\u201d I exclaimed. \u201cIf only that were so.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cExactly. In writing, you\u2019re producing an original text \u2014 at least we hope it\u2019s original! In editing, you\u2019re correcting an existing document that someone else has written. I don\u2019t see the two as the same thing at all.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ll have to think about that,\u201d I said. \u201cIn the meantime, let\u2019s discuss more practical matters. For you to edit my document, I had to send it to you over the internet. After you were finished, I had to download and reopen it in Word to see what you\u2019d done. Can\u2019t you work on my document in Word itself?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNot directly \u2014 I can\u2019t control Word as a running application. But you\u2019re a programmer as well as an editor. You could create a Word add-in that sends me text and then inserts my changes back into Word. The editing would happen natively, with no importing or exporting, and the user would never leave Word.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a fantastic idea!\u201d I said. \u201cHow hard can it be?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019d be surprised,\u201d Claude said.<\/p>\n

Six months later (ouch), I'm pleased and proud to present MarkMyWords, providing AI-assisted copyediting directly in Microsoft Word:<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.editorium.com\/MarkMyWords.htm<\/a><\/p>\n

What is MarkMyWords?<\/h3>\n

MarkMyWords is a Microsoft Word add-in that uses Anthropic\u2019s Claude AI to copyedit text directly in Word. Claude acts as an editorial assistant, performing initial reviews and making improvements based on your choice of carefully curated prompts in MarkMyWords \u2014 or your own custom instructions. All edits appear as tracked changes, so you can accept or reject each modification, maintaining full control over the final content.<\/p>\n

MarkMyWords uses Anthropic's API (Application Programming Interface), not the web-based, consumer claude.ai interface, so your text is not<\/em> used for AI training or retained for other purposes.<\/p>\n

Editing with MarkMyWords is far different from working with tools like PerfectIt or Editor's ToolKit Plus, which use Word macros and advanced find and replace to fix problems. MarkMyWords uses Claude AI to find and fix problems intelligently<\/em>, with an awareness of meaning and context. For example, my full test document about the life of Mark Twain erroneously says the rock group Creedence Clearwater Revival got one of their lyrics from Twain: \u201cBut I never saw the good side of the city till I hitched a ride on a riverboat queen.\u201d Claude detected the problem, deleted the statement, and added this comment: \u201cNOTE: The statement about Creedence Clearwater Revival contains a factual error. The quoted lyrics are from \u2018Proud Mary\u2019 (1969), not from Twain\u2019s Life on the Mississippi<\/em> (1883). This sentence should be deleted or substantially revised for accuracy.\u201d<\/p>\n

With that kind of intelligence, Claude can significantly streamline your editing workflow. Nevertheless, Claude should be viewed as a supportive tool rather than a substitute for a human mind. Human oversight remains essential for critical or complex editing tasks.<\/p>\n

You really need to try<\/em> MarkMyWords to understand how useful, helpful, and powerful this kind of editing can be. You can use the program for 45 days free of charge, and you don't<\/em> need a subscription to Claude! Learn more and get started here:<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.editorium.com\/MarkMyWords.htm<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

http:\/\/claude.ai \u201cHow can I help you today?\u201d Claude asked. I pondered the question, then decided to simply jump in and see what happened. \u201cI\u2019m an editor,\u201d I replied. \u201cI work on books. Novels, biographies, histories, essays. Can you help me edit those documents?\u201d \u201cAbsolutely,\u201d he said. \u201cThat is exactly the kind of work I\u2019m well […]<\/p>\n<\/a>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[65,29,77,175,16,8,1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-6474","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-breaking-news","7":"category-business-of-editing-2","8":"category-computers-and-software","9":"category-editing-tools-editorial-matters","10":"category-microsoft-word","11":"category-programs","12":"category-uncategorized","13":"h-entry","14":"hentry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3gfno-1Gq","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/editorium.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6474","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/editorium.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/editorium.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/editorium.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/editorium.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6474"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/editorium.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6474\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/editorium.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6474"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/editorium.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6474"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/editorium.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6474"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}