Flutterings

Er... speaking as a professional editor, I can't help flinching when folks condemn editors for an author's failings (of which there's understandably been a lot in the wake of DH, so it's not just your comment sparking my lament here). I do see it as my job to point out to authors where I think they could do better, but it's not my job to make them agree with me, and I don't always manage to persuade them it's in their best interests to do so.

An editor can't and shouldn't convert dross into gold, and most project budgets don't allow that kind of involvement anyhow (I'm paid only to make suggestions, not to perform alchemy), and when in doubt, it's incumbent on me to leave the author's "voice" alone. So much as I personally dislike the "It is I" constructs in both HBP and DH, I can actually understand JKR's editors choosing to regard them as authorial stylings and leaving them alone. I can't swear I wouldn't have done the same -- there are plenty of sentences in publications I've worked on where I've had to resist the temptation to rewrite what's there instead of merely to edit (and it's something I have guard against constantly when I edit or beta, since I do have a strong, distinct authorial voice that's very me -- and thus inappropriate to impose on other writers). So, as far as I'm concerned, it's ultimately the author's responsibility to find and accept the editing (s)he needs, especially given that (s)he generally gets all the credit when everything goes well. ;-)