AN AMERICAN LOOKS AT THE - LONDON PRESS
[We publish below an article on the English Press by the London rc.rrespondent of a famous American newspaper. We' apologise in advance to all our great contemporaries for the light, not to say frivolous, style in which they are mentioned. What. he would havo said of us had he permitted himself that licence, we tremble to think ! His special verdicts must not always be held to be ours.— ED. Spectator.] ONDON. newspapers, I find, are either intentionally -LA long-winded and "dull," or intentionally breathless and bright. In both categories they are supreme. There, are no better journals in the world of the long-winded and so-called dull type than the Daily Telegraph and the Times. There are no better panting and dazzling ones than the Evening Standard, the Daily .Express and the Star. Why no newspaper has pre-empted the twilight zone between dullness and dazzle is a problem . whose study would lead to valuable knowledge of the London newspaper public. This is elemental, the dull Press is published for a small and select circulation, and the dazzle Press for the masses. And this also is elemental, in which- ever category a London newspaper falls, it has been meant to fall there. None of the London newspapers is dull because its editors have tried to make it otherwise and failed. None of the others is keyed up save by highly- paid specialists in this artifice.
By nature I am among the small body of readers for whom the tedious and dull newspaper has been created. I believe the Daily Telegraph, in its way, is the best news- paper in the world. I prefer the New York Times in some respects, for its news is even more complete, and the spirit in which it is told is often more detached. But the New York Timet lacks the dignity and experience of the Daily Telegraph. The Manchester Guardian, if it can be considered a London newspaper, I should rank as the world's pre-eminent journal of opinion. But, strictly speaking, it is not a vewspaper. Neither is the Morning Post, which I should place second to it in this field. The line in the case of either is not to be drawn dogmatically. But I search all the London newspapers daily for information, not opinion, and it is the Daily Telegraph which best repays my effort.
Toward the Telegraph I have grown to feel a deep and incoherent loyalty. It is a loyalty one might feel toward an aloof, ungainly, but marvellous woman. It may be nearly impossible to get the acquaintance started, or to discover the rare attributes concealed under her unbeautiful exterior, but once the technique of com- munion is mastered her virtues shine beyond all prizes. So it was with the Telegraph. I courted its unwieldy pages, blinded my eyes in learning what portions of its cruelly printed columns I could ignore, and at last became aware that it had a depth of merits that defied analysis. I can give only a partial explanation. I must have from a newspaper a well-rounded account of all outstanding events at home, and a comprehensive appraisal of the doings in foreign countries. I ask a sound judgment of the present, a knowledge of the past and an intelligent forecast of things to come. All these, I think, the Telegraph supplies me better than any other newspaper I know. Then I must have the feeling that the whole world is translated into my presence every clay, and this feeling the Telegraph often arouses in me, though on this score I must find some fault. The Telegraph is prejudiced about Russia. And to cite a particular case, it did not report Gandhi's speech before the recent Indian Congress at any length, but fed me instead with a cablegram telling me in what respects its correspondent judged the speech to have been a failure. This is-opinion-making;- not news-bringing.- It-may have been good policy for the publisher, but, according to my conceits, it was defective journalism.. I should, have had the speech and been allowed to agree or disagree with the correspondent as I preferred. The Times failed in exactly the same way, along with the entire London Press, unless my reading was too hurried.
The Diplomatic Correspondent of the Telegraph is, I think, the best reporter in London, and, in his .field, in the world. He is by no means the most winsome writer in journalism, but I untangle his sentences gladly,. for experience has taught me to trust and value his news.
He worked so well during the London Conference last summer as to become something like an international scandal, for he published exclusively, day after day, a paraphrase of the actual minutes of all the secret sessions of the Conference. He thus proved, single-handed, that secrecy was not essential to the smooth -progress of dip- lomacy. In ordinary times his contributions are more illuminating to me than those of all the other diplomatic correspondents combined. I imagine that many foreign diplomats in London generously use his visits to compile the regular budget of information they dispatch to their home Governments.
The Times is far less forbidding than the Telegraph, and has several strong writers, to confine myself merely to a comparison of newsmen. Its Washington corre- spondent is probably the ablest - political foreign correspondent alive. . But I find the Times bores me, and the Telegraph doesn't, and I am unable. to provide adequate reasons, even to myself. It may merely be that I contribute more to the Telegraph in the way of reading effort. It may have something to do with the light face of tlig headlines in the Times, or it may be some other subtly inferior dramatic quality. Once I attain the Telegraph's information it excites and satisfies me more than the same information in the Times. A page. in the Times somehow does not challenge my immediate curiosity.
The technique of the big-circulation newspapers is wholly different. No subtleties can puzzle the observer here. The aim is to simplify and brighten the news. The reader under no account is to be awed by the detail and complexities of life. And since he loses half the fun of a newspaper he must have a substitute. This substitute is gossip, which gives him a familiarity with events without any of the labour of understanding them. By gossip I do not mean tale-bearing, I mean small-talk. Retailing small-talk has been developed to an art which is so superior to that practised in other lands that an Englishman might almost be proud of it. American newspapers try to be " bright " and " snappy " and to "get down to the level of their public," but they are as children in comparison with the London popular Press.
To the Evening Standard should go any trophy that may be given for achievement along these lines., "A Londoner," whose diary is by far the most entertaining feature in the British Press, is for me 'one of the great figures in journalism to-day. Someone once tried to tell me that "A Londoner" was, in fact, a synthetic person, made up of bits of persons fortuitously united into a mythical entity. In other words, the diary was compiled by the staff and many outside friends.. I resented the imputation as an outburst of ruthless icono- clasm. I know "A Londoner," how he looks, how he lives. He is about eighty-eight, but appears a ruddy, robust, distinguished sixty' under his becoming snow- white hair. Six months of each year he devotes to travel, calling at all capitals and cities of the civilized world and visiting all their- celebrated- men. What is more, with miraculous discernment he seeks out all the young men who later on will become celebrated, and visits them, invariably 'at dramatic Moments in their early careers. At least half of his arduous life must have been spent in this pursuit. For the remainder of his time his genius 'leads him about in London. He is on the most intimate • lunching terms with all society, and with every member of the Government, or of any Govern- ment that might ever conceivably come into office. He dines his way around all the fashionable restaurants, and is not too fatigued to dance Often in places frequented by royalty and the aristocracy. He sees every notable play, and hears many more concerts than any average music lover. He attends all public and private picture -exhibitions. He- consorts with barristers and stock- brokers, actors, authors, statesmen, painters, musicians, in fine, with everyone who has had the fortune to break prominently into -print or to play a part in modern life. With this acquaintanceship, combined with his fabulous zeal, he is able to function like no other hero mall truth and fiction. How he succeeds in visiting so many distant lands and yet in publishing his three columns every day in London is a• problem I abandon to the relativitists. I merely note that he succeeds. He regales me with the very best of gossip, with gossip that is the cream of ubiquity and urbanity. Now and again, I admit, he becomes opinionated,, and has prejudices that denote hardening of the arteries of his spirit. But I know he is old and must be .very weary. And these recalcitrant views only go to make him what he is. After all, like so many less gifted journalists of his school, his life has been devoted to gossip, not wisdom.
LONDON AMERICAN.
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