Subs — sub-editors (copy editors in America) — have a thankless job if this is the kind of abuse they have to take from writers in British newspapers. The Times food reviewer Giles Coren cusses, effs and p’s all over the subs for “s*** sub-editing”. He ticks them off in an email:

It was the final sentence. Final sentences are very, very important. A piece builds to them, they are the little jingle that the reader takes with him into the weekend.

I wrote: “I can’t think of a nicer place to sit this spring over a glass of rosé and watch the boys and girls in the street outside smiling gaily to each other, and wondering where to go for a nosh.”

It appeared as: “I can’t think of a nicer place to sit this spring over a glass of rosé and watch the boys and girls in the street outside smiling gaily to each other, and wondering where to go for nosh.”

See the difference? There’s no “a” before “nosh” in the second version. The indefinite article is missing.

“Tell me the exact reasoning which led you to remove that word from my copy,” Coren demands an explanation.

The email wound up at the Guardian, which duly published it. It’s currently among its most viewed articles. Such a hullabaloo about a missing “a”.

Do subs in Singapore, India or America face the same kind of heat?