SWATANTRA—SEPTEMBER 27,
1947
A WRITER in a recently started weekly journal called upon one
of the Ministers the other day to go and drown himself in the Cooum. I cite this
as an example of advice that is never likely to be acted upon by those to whom
it is addressed, however vigorously or captivatingly the advice may be phrased.
Good journalism should restrict itself to purposes capable of being realized.
In the expounding of opinion there is no charm in getting the plaudits of those
who are already on your side. Achievement consists in forcing readers who
belong to the “other” side to change over to your own under the irresistible
compulsion of argument. In British journalism J. A. Spender excelled all others
in this sort of achievement.
* * *
Lord Northcliffe said of Spender
that he was the only man who could edit The
Times, but it is with the Westminster Gazette that Spender’s name is
primarily associated. In a note on spender’s completion of twenty-one years of
editorship, the Manchester Guardian
wrote, “The Westminster is the one
journal in London which sells on its leader. It is unlike all other London
leaders in that it is addressed to and read by the thoughtful section of the
opposite party.” Spender was a devotee of the Liberal Party and the Westminster while he edited it was
regarded as the most authoritative exponent of Liberalism in the British Press.
But party loyalty never led to decline of intellectual independence in his
case. In a laudatory letter to Spender, Sir Edward Grey said, “You manage to
combine independent thought with unswerving support of the party in a way which
is rare. It makes your articles like the opinion of a valued colleague. I know
nothing else in journalism like it.”
* * *
Spender made a mark for
reasonableness “not unsalted with wit”, and his peculiar combination of sanity,
sincerity and scrupulous fairness which always made for moderation of
expression was a source of constant exasperation to unreasonable opponents who
found themselves powerless to deal with him in the customary styles of
invective and denunciation. Spender used reason as the supreme journalistic
weapon in a rather coldblooded way, but he had a passion for taking himself
seriously and facing most respectfully the arguments of those who differed from
him. He was a warmhearted apostle of journalistic integrity who felt sorely
distressed professionally whenever he saw the power of the Press used for
purposes that did not conduce to the public good. On such occasions he went out
of his way to remonstrate with newspaper proprietors and persuade them to
return to the paths of social duty.
* * *
Once when Lord Northcliffe
conducted in the Daily Mail a
campaign which Spender felt was doing a great deal of harm to the public, he
went to Lord Northcliffe and objected to the campaign and begged him to put a
stop to it. The story of how Lord Northcliffe dealt with his appeal is given by
Robert Hichens in his just published autobiography, Yesterday:
“Northcliffe touched a bell and gave an order. The order was
that the circulation sheets of the Daily Mail, from before the beginning of the
campaign to that moment, should be brought to him. They were brought, and Lord
Northcliffe showed them to Spender. The sheets proved that even since the
beginning of the campaign which Spender considered so harmful to public opinion
the circulation of the paper had been steadily rising.
“You see!” Lord Northcliff said.
Spender said, “Yes ! Well?”
Lord Northcliffe simply moved his broad shoulders, as much as
tosay, “How can you possibly expect me to stop a campaign that is doing so much
good to the paper?”
And the interview came to an end.
* * *
The Northcliffian tradition has spread from Britain to the
rest of the world. It has not spread the Press of this poor country. We have journals
run to create bad blood because the creation of bad blood is popular with excited
groups primed for mutual recrimination and belligerency and happens for the
time to be commercially profitable. It was the distinction of Spender’s Westminster that though it lost money
and had, compared with the millions of readers of the Northcliffian Press, an
inconsiderable circulation, it commanded a greater weight of influence per
reader, having regard to the character of its readers, than any other London
paper existing then or since. A revealing reminiscence indicating the
superiority of the Westminster in the
matter of continual gripping of intelligent readers’ interest is given by Sir
Robert Edgcumbe:
“I was travelling to London on a Thursday afternoon, and was
alone in my compartment. At Hatfield Lord Salisbury got into the same carriage,
and as the train moved off he was handed three evening papers. Shortly after we
started he took them up, opened first the Globe
and immediately threw it upon the floor of the carriage; then he opened the Evening Standard and treated it in a
similar manner; lastly he opened the Westminster
diligently until we arrived at King’s Cross station.”
* * *
Some papers are just glanced at by their readers and thrown
away. Some are bought for racing tips. Some for the appeal to avarice they
contain in the form of lavish crossword puzzles. Some for the pictures of
captivating pin-up girls which they print. And quite a lot (of late) for the
predictions they venture as a regular feature to lure the anxious and the
despondent tossed about in the sea of life’s troubles, with imaginary paradises
of impending good fortune. These inroads on journalism by skilled exploiters of
crowd hungers serve to confound professional eminence and success with the mere
knack of putting through techniques of remunerative sensationalism. They have
been tending to vulgarise the Press and to deprive it more and more of its
social purpose. A great pity!
* *
*
The date of publication of this issue of Swatantra synchronises with the silver jubilee of K. Iswara Dutt’s
entry into journalism. His friends and admirers are celebrating the happy
occasion in a fitting manner. Dutt is now Public Relations Officer in
Hyderabad. It is a singularly difficult and delicate post to hold at the
present juncture. It is remarkable that not even a tiny smear of the wild
passion roused in all and sundry by the state of affairs now prevailing in that
gravely disturbed State should have clung to him in the process of his official
duties so closely connected with its Government. This gift of coming unscathed
through storms that would have broken to pieces and wrecked the career of any
less indomitably pleasant spirit, is Dutt’s unique asset. He has conquered all
difficulties with a social charm that has taken most of India’s great, captive.
Of Arthur Mee, a man of wonder in Britain’s Fleet Street, whose expertness in
fitting every conceivable topic on earth with relevant tit-bits of historical
interest, accounted to genius, admirers used to ask, Wherefrom did he gather
all this knowledge? Early in his career Arthur Mee began a collection of
cuttings from every available source which in course of time grew to such dimensions
that a huge cabinet of many drawers was required to accommodate them all. It
was insured for a thousand pounds. The result of his analysis and assortment of
every scrap of general information collected through years of daily examination
of the Press was to build up Arthur Mee into a prodigy of encyclopaedic
knowledge with stupendous mastery over a vast variety of miscellaneous
subjects. Dutt has a stock of cuttings that can be worthily compared with
Mee’s. It is a rich treasure house from which invaluable results can be
expected. Acquaintance with it has fashioned Dutt into a literary craftsman of
exceptional polish.—(September 27, 1947) S
A K A.
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