Q. A manuscript I am editing uses a lengthy extract from a source that uses brackets; in fact the original is sprinkled with unitalicized bracketed “sics.” What do I do? I don’t want readers to think these interjections are added by us! I could say “brackets in original,” but there are a couple of things we have had to add in brackets, too. Perhaps I should put a [ sic] next to every [sic]. (Just kidding.)
A. Yes, adding a note “Brackets in original” is the right thing to do (although I love your idea of siccing the sics!). When you add your own comments within brackets, append “Eds.” (or just “Ed.”) to the text to clarify.