MARGINAL COMMENT
By HAROLD NICOLSON
BRITISH journalism has adopted many successive fads and fashions since the now distant day when Alfred Harmsworth realised that popular education had created a demand for a new type of newspaper. Answers had already suggested to him that there were many men, women and children who were able to read the printed word but who were deterred by the stately tone of voice which was then adopted by the more serious newspapers. It was on May 4th, 1896, that the first copy of the Daily Mail appeared. Until that day my elders and betters would refer to those newspapers which did not reflect their own political opinions as " the gutter Press," and would dismiss all those who contributed to such journals as "Grub Street hacks." The arrival of the Daily Mail brought with it an alteration in this vocabulary ; my grandmother thereafter would talk about " the halfpenny newspapers " and, since she was a woman of independent mind, would welcome the advent of this admirable journal, contending that it was a fine symptom that the same newspaper should be read at the same time in the dining-room and the servants' hall. Her sympathy for the Daily Mail was, I admit, somewhat chilled during the early stages of the Boer War. Alfred Harmsworth (and it was much to his credit) had the courage to defy popularity and to point out with some astringency that our
• army was old-fashioned, the War Office fast asleep and our generals more incompetent even than those who had mishandled the Crimean War. The Daily Mail during that ill-tempered period was called the Daily Wail. But it certainly performed a public service during the dark days of our defeats, even as fourteen years later it aroused popular clamour against the shortage of shells. Today, I am glad to think, the Daily Mail has become a Permanent institution, with a clever younger brother over in Paris who provides even more sparkling news and articles for the Englishman abroad.
* * * * I happened the other day, when going through some ancient press- cutting albums, to come across a complete copy of the Daily Mail for some day in 19oz. I observed that even at that early date Alfred Harmsworth was indulging in what, in subsequent years, his detractors would call " stunts." He was trying to interest his sub- scribers in the internal combustion engine, and he foretold the day when motor cars would cease to be the ridiculous and dangerous toys of the excessively rich and would become the accustomed means of locomotion for you and me. His pioneer work upon this theme was as vivid and useful as that which some years later he devoted to popularising aviation. It is true that not all the causes which Alfred Harmsworth espoused were equally important or creative. There was a period when the Daily Mail became a sweet-pea fuss ; there was a phase in which we were exhorted never to eat white bread ; and there was an even more engaging moment when we were told to wear a new kind of hat. The hat chosen for popular consumption was a compromise between a top-hat and a bowler ; a famous and most handsome actor was induced to have his photo- graph taken wearing this hat upon the Embankment ; but, such is our national shyness about unconventional clothing, such our distaste for attracting the curious or admiring gaze of passers-by, that no citizen (apart from the actor and I suppose one or two of the more subservient members of Carmelite House) was ever persuaded to venture upon the Daily Mail hat. The fact remains none the less that Harmsworth's " stunts " were frequently important causes ; and that he did an immense amount of good in creating a mood of greater vivacity and alertness among people who, until then, had taken only an apathetic interest in innovations.
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My admiration for Alfred Harmsworth was much increased, or revived, by turning over this old copy of the Daily Mail of 19oz. Yet what interested me even more was the difference between the lay-out of the paper and that to which we have become accustomed today. I do not say that there were no headlines ; what struck me rather was that the headlines were written in the English, and not
A more recent tendency, and one which grates upon my Edwardian nerves, is to strain at a sparkling effect by emphasising personality.
It is a commonplace of modern journalism to assert that the public arc more interested in people than they are in events, and the habit has therefore arisen of reporting occurrences under headlines descrip- tive of the individuals to whom these occurrences happen. A very reputable journal, which has for years been the first newspaper which I read in the morning, has of late striven to brighten its front page by what is surely an over-indulgence in this (to me) abhorrent practice. On the same page in the same issue I read the headline " Fred has the thrill of his life " and beside it another headline "Time Stopped for Miss Mary." Under the first headline I am informed that a Mr. Fred Titmus has been asked to play cricket for Middlesex, an item of information which leaves me cold. Under the second headline, I learn that Miss Mary Moscrop died at the age of eighty-four leaving a substantial legacy to the poor of the village of Saticy in the county of Durham. I have no objection to being told these things, but I am irritated by the assumption that my interest in these episodes will be enhanced by the use of Christian names. It does not make me feel any closer or warmer to Mr. Titmus that he should appeal under the name of Fred ; my respect for Miss Moscrop's legacy is not increased or enlightened by the fact that my newspaper calls her Miss Mary. On the contrary, my sympathies are alienated by this improper intimacy, nor do I really believe that the circulation of the newspaper is enlarged by this brisk matiness. If I were Miss Moscrop I should resent being called Mary posthu- mously in the public prints.
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This sad habit of manufacturing fraudulent intimacy is, I fear, spreading even to semi-official publications. I received this morning a pamphlet on soil erosion prepared under the auspices of Current Affairs and with the approval of U.N.E.S.C.O. The whole thing has been dolled up to entice the reader into believing that he is being told an exciting tale of personal endeavour. We have The Story of Antonio Arangs, The Story of Don Cristobal, The Story of the Ordinary Man. There are some people perhaps who will read the pamphlet in this novelette form who would not read it if it contained the facts of the problem seriously stated ; but are they useful people ? For ten people who are tricked by this method of presentation there must be at least twenty who are alienated by the implied reflection on their intelligence. Is it reactionary of me to wish that we could revert to the more sober and less personal habits of 19oz ?
in the American, language. It would be an interesting task for some young philologist to examine the effect upon language of the technical circumstance that large headlines entail short words. Thus if a Royal Commission were appointed to conduct an investigation into the decline in the birthrate, or the incidence of juvenile delinquency, the word used by the headline artist would not be " investigation " or even " enquiry," it would be " probe." When a prominent figure is mentioned as a possible candidate for the post of Secretary General of the United Nations Organisation, the news appears as " Jones listed for UNO." In the United States at least these two headline words have become part of the usual currency of journalism ; so far how- ever they have not passed into the spoken language. I rather like the word " probe," in spite of its medical associations, and I have no special objection to the word " listed " ; yet they arc neither of them words which I should use naturally in conversation or which would, if detached from a headline, be readily understood. It might even be contended by some purists that a beneficial influence will be exercised upon the English language by the practice of employing always the shorter word, since our longer words are generally of less pure derivation than our short words ; they have a less Anglo-Saxon ring. Yet I should regret the day when our headlines became entirely Americanised, if only because I should find them difficult to understand.
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