WHAT TO PRINT--THE PROBLEM OF HOW TO INTEREST AND INFORM THE READER
In his meditations over newspaper possibilities the late Joseph
Pulitzer found himself reasoning that the existing newspapers were
written above the understanding of the multitudes and consequently were
not read by them. Hundreds of thousands of the metropolitan district
population read no daily newspaper because the prices of the sheets
were high and because editorial utterances were “over their heads,”
were too profound, too argumentative, too scholarly. Mr. Pulitzer
pictured to himself a newspaper so simple of speech and so simple of
editorial expression that this vast population could understand it.
He purchased the New York _World_, reduced its price, tried to make
it appeal to the masses, and before long he had attained a very great
circulation and a very great fortune.
Now, Mr. Pulitzer accomplished this result by contemplating his
newspaper from the viewpoint of the reader rather than from that of
the editor. He gave the people something they had wanted. Giving the
public what it wants is the surest way of securing a horde of readers.
His reading matter was mild; the typography spectacular. He attracted
attention with headlines a foot high and with letter press that looked
like thickly woven barbed wire fence. One half the page was daubed with
blotches of black type and the other half was smeared with red ink. But
typographical eccentricity alone does little harm; it’s a question of
taste.
Mr. Pulitzer had made his great success on the lines indicated above
and was breathing easily. It was not until another man came along who
outdid Mr. Pulitzer in multiple exaggerations of the same game that
the country saw the most riotous journalism ever known anywhere. Mr.
Pulitzer’s early efforts at sensationalism were as a smoking ash barrel
when compared with the Vesuvius of volcanic flame and melted lava that
followed. That Mr. Hearst would collect a bigger mob of readers was
inevitable, but Mr. Pulitzer lost no readers and gained many. Both
establishments kept up the contest as long as circulations continued to
grow; but with the pause of the rocket rise things began to simmer down
to a less spectacular splendor of insanity. The inflammation of the
imagination subsided and gradually they approached the routine and the
respectability of the other newspapers.
It was the same old story--the story so familiar to every journalist of
ripening years--of building up a newspaper circulation by spectacular
methods and then relapsing into ordinary goodness with a deliberation
so gradual that the reader does not notice the change. For every editor
knows that the more details of sin, vice, and crime he crams into his
newspaper the more copies of that newspaper will be sold; and every
editor knows that the most subtle temptation that besets him is the
temptation to print the things that should not be printed and that
temptation is the more acute because he knows that the people want to
read them. Aye! there’s the rub! The people want the sensational stuff.
The very sensational newspapers sell three or four times as many copies
as do the conservative ones. The proportion is even larger in London
and Paris. In our large cities almost all the newspapers of great
circulation began the building up process by audacious sensationalism;
as they became prosperous they became moderate.
Joseph Addison of long-ago literary fame recognized the public liking
for sensation. He says in _The Spectator_: “At the same time I am
very sensible that nothing spreads a paper like private calumny and
defamation.” And the Rev. Lyman Abbott, in rebuking the sensational
press, was moved to remark: “Is the defense of the newspaper that
it must give the public what it wants a good one? Most certainly
no!--no more than the selling of whiskey, opium, stale fish or decayed
vegetables. The editor is or ought to be a public teacher.” The popular
taste that demands this sensational sort of newspaper stimulant
attracted the notice of Lafcadio Hearn, who remarks: “Everywhere
there is a public of this kind to whom lachrymose emotion and mawkish
sentiment give the same kind of pleasure that black, red, and blazing
yellow give to the eyes of little children and savages.”
Conversely, the _Christian Science Monitor_ is read by thousands of
persons for the reason not so much that it represents a religious
emotion as that it prints wholesome news free from spasm. “It reflects
the true balance of the world’s work and refuses to see only the
evil and morbid happenings in it and let it appear that they are the
preponderant forces of the world’s efforts. Thus it emphasizes the
decent things, the heroic things, the things worth while.” With fairly
good service the _Christian Science Monitor_ presents the news of the
day, and it especially appeals to parents who wish to keep the tart
news reports of the secular press from their children.
What to print? That is a query that has disturbed many an editor’s
nightcap. So much depends on the editorial purpose. If the editor seeks
to have a wholesome influence, seeks to do good, seeks a reputation
for honesty of purpose and honesty of community service he naturally
will stick to a conservative course; for somehow, exaggeration and
sensationalism, not to mention falsehood, do not seem quite to
harmonize with moral precepts; nor do they inspire confidence in the
editor’s influence. The conservative sheets are duller, but they are
trusted the more--and public confidence is a mighty fine foundation on
which to build a healthy circulation.
Many persons read the same newspaper for years and years. They become
used to its ways, to its arrangement of news and topics; and they
have confidence in its integrity. It comes to be almost a spiritual
consolation to them. They swear by it and they believe in it just
as they believe in their pastor or their family physician. This is
especially true of readers in the smaller cities and villages although
it prevails everywhere. Now, it behooves the editor to nurse this
attitude, for once it gets hold on a community it is hard to dislodge.
It grows like a river after spring rains, slowly but surely increasing
in volume and in strength. The people bought Greeley’s _Tribune_
because they believed that Greeley was honest. They were willing to be
influenced by what he said. For the same reason Bowles’s Springfield
_Republican_ became popular and prosperous. Throughout the country we
have repeated instances of newspapers having the confidence of the
community because they are honestly conducted.
The New York _Times_ is perhaps our most gratifying exhibit of a
newspaper advanced to supreme success by conservative methods. Free
from exaggeration of statement, or typographical appearance, or
hysteria of any sort, it has grown to great circulation and influence.
Mr. Ochs planned this result on the theory of giving to each reader the
things in which he was personally interested, printing the news in such
volume as to attract a great variety of interests. The lawyer found the
full court calendar, the real estate man a record of every sale, the
sporting enthusiast the result of every game.
Reversal of political policy has damaged the prosperity of many a
newspaper. In 1872 the New York _Tribune_, the Chicago _Tribune_,
and the Cincinnati _Commercial Tribune_, that had built up large
circulations and had secured a profitable business as Republican
newspapers, bolted the nomination of the Republican candidate,
President Grant, and supported Horace Greeley, the Liberal Democratic
nominee, for the presidency. They lost more than half of their readers.
In 1884, the New York _Times_, that always had been unflinchingly
Republican, bolted the nomination of James G. Blaine and supported the
candidacy of Grover Cleveland, the Democratic standard bearer. It lost
half of its readers. In the same campaign, the _Sun_, of New York, that
heretofore had favored the Democratic cause, bolted Cleveland. It lost
more than half of its readers.
Many other instances of loss of circulation in consequence of change
of political policy might be given. Newspaper editors of long memories
expect popular resentment of a turn-coat policy and they give great
consideration to any change before making it. No amount or degree
of caressing talk or pussy-paw argument seems to soothe the man
whose politics or religion has been attacked. Also, if you attack a
man’s politics or his religion you are likely to make that man your
enemy--and almost every man has a trace of politics or religion in
his makeup. He regards it as a personal assault on himself. He also
resents criticism of a friend or of the object of his hero worship. The
newspaper that attacked General Grant when Grant was the idol of the
nation, when he was worshiped because he had led our armies to victory,
that newspaper lost thousands of readers and its editor lost a host of
his personal friends. The newspaper that attacked the Rev. Henry Ward
Beecher with more violence than did any other newspaper, at the time of
the famous Beecher trial, lost three or four thousand of its readers a
day while the attacks continued. The public had become greatly excited
and divided over the question of Mr. Beecher’s guilt or innocence.
Neighbors shook fists in each other’s faces on Brooklyn street corners
and the angry controversy spread all over the country. The church
people in general championed the pastor and their defense of him came
at length, in a way, to be regarded as a defense of religion as well,
and the newspaper assaults as an attack on religion.
We have said that it behooves the editor who has the confidence of his
constituents to nurse that confidence--that a circulation based on
confidence is not easily lost. Nevertheless, it is fatal to mislead the
public. It is dangerous to circulation to go against public sentiment.
A knowledge of public sentiment and the ability to anticipate public
sentiment are brilliants, indeed, in the editor’s jewelbox of sagacity.
The absolutely fearless editor who values his opinion more than he
values his income, will slam into the public’s most cherished notions
if he thinks he is right. He will take a violent attitude on all
public questions. The timid editor shuns controversy. His policy is
to praise rather than to condemn. He fears unpopularity. He knows
that to lambaste the city government is to lose the city printing. He
strives to please everybody, to avoid antagonizing any large part of
the community. The fearless editor disregards consequences; the timid
editor avoids them.
Mr. Dana used to say: “We must make the paper talked about. We must
make it more interesting. The people will not buy it if it is dull.”
Concerning a piece of inconsequential news that he had clipped from
its columns he wrote: “This is not good. It is too commonplace. There
is no poetry in it. A blockhead might have written it.” He abhorred
the commonplace. He urged constantly that minor routine news be put
aside for anything bright or unusual, that verbal tediousness be hooted
out of the place. He loved literature. He appreciated and praised
good writing and he inspired his staff to enthusiasm for it, and to
superexcellence of workmanship. Mr. Dana chose to lead public opinion
rather than be led by it. He wrote with extraordinary forcefulness and
with entire disregard, with absolute unconcern, as to the effect of
his utterances on the circulation of the paper. Repeatedly he printed
articles that he knew must cost him thousands of readers.
Greeley’s idea was to print a newspaper of national importance and
national influence; and that meant of course the printing of a lot of
national politics. He sought to be a great political leader, to be the
champion of his party. He was little interested as a journalist in the
ordinary run of news.
Whitelaw Reid, who succeeded Greeley as editor of the New York
_Tribune_, once said: “The thing always forgotten by the closest
critics of the newspapers is that the newspapers must be measurably
what their readers make them, what their constituents call for and
sustain.” Reid wished the _Tribune_ to be of national importance.
His remark naturally recalls the continuous performance discussion
as to whether the newspapers lead the people or whether public
opinion leads the newspapers. But we must agree, I am sure, that it
is useless to give the people what they do not want.
How can we best interest the reader? People enjoy reading about the
things in which they have participated. If you have attended a public
meeting you follow with pleasure the newspaper report of that meeting.
You are grateful to recognize things you remember the speaker to have
said. If you have been to the theater you want to read a report or
a criticism of the performance. You are pleased especially if the
critic mentions some good or poor feature that you had noticed. It is
a sort of verification of your judgment. You feel a sense of personal
participation in the article. The same is true of the opera or a
music event. All these things are constantly recurring, and reporters
and critics are likely to become so familiar with them that their
importance becomes obscured. This is true of opera and theater notices.
The opera critic who has been listening to Faust for thirty years
ceases to write much about it; but the young person who hears the opera
for the first time is disappointed because so little is printed about
the performance.
We are much more interested in accounts of the ball games, the prize
fights, the contests of any sort that we have seen than we can be in
those not seen.
To the man or woman in society the news of society is infinitely more
than mere gossip. The society man of any pretension must know what
society folk are doing, must be informed of their every movement.
His newspaper gives the hint for many letters. He must congratulate
the family whose daughter’s engagement is announced. He must
sympathize with the bereaved. Society news has the personal note, and
personalities sell newspapers. Cram your sheet with them, young man!
We are living in a commercial age, a money-making age. People are
thinking as never before of money accumulation and business expansion.
The journalistic tendency of the hour is to exalt the practical and
minimize the sentimental. War has made us money mad. We note a growing
fascination for articles of the practical, of how great fortunes are
developed, of how money is made and lost, of how the poor become rich
and the rich become poor--stories of business construction involving
millions, of the application of invention to everyday needs. This
kind of narrative includes the recital of personal successes, how the
quick-witted boy becomes a captain of industry, how Nature’s forces
are utilized and Nature’s secrets are turned to practical account. The
details of how great success or great wealth has been achieved never
have failed to fascinate mankind.
All fiction has been saturated with stories of money-seeking because
the topic is so interesting. Nevertheless fiction can but feebly
compete with the realities of the present. The tales of great gambling
in Wall Street, of card conquests at Monte Carlo, of new gold
discoveries, of money made in real-estate speculations, of gigantic
swindling operations, of big winnings on the racing track, of mental
smartness in money-getting, of big success in any quest for cash--you
cannot give the public too much of this kind of matter if you wish to
sell your sheet.
But, if you ask me to describe the kind of news for which the people
surge and struggle around the bulletin boards--the most popular kind of
news printed anywhere--I must reply that it is found in the details of
a conquest, a fight, whether between men with their fists, or dogs, or
armies, politicians or polo players, football teams or racing horses,
church choirs or kitchen cabinets.
I remember so well that in my boyhood days my own little village held
its breath to await details of the world’s champion prize fight between
John C. Heenan, of America, and Tom Sayers, of England. Not since that
day has interest in prize fights languished. The fist fight between
John L. Sullivan and James Corbett quadrupled the circulation of
next-day newspapers. Repeatedly the big New York Madison Square Garden
has been crowded to its roof with enthusiasts who paid from fifteen to
fifty dollars to see two men batter each other. Fifty thousand persons
see the big football games, and fifteen millions read about them.
So great is the interest in baseball contests the newspapers are
compelled to print from seven to ten columns a day in description of
them. The same conditions exist to a triflingly less degree only with
contests in tennis, rowing, polo, yachting, horse racing, golf--any
event, especially in athletics, involving a fight for supremacy. I
know of one New York newspaper that confidently counts on an increase
of eighteen or twenty thousand in circulation with the opening of the
baseball season. There seems to be no limit to popular interest in the
details of any kind of contest, especially one that has been lavishly
advertised.
Business usually languishes every four years while the fight for the
Presidency proceeds, and the newspapers print hundreds of columns about
it. The squabbles, the encounters, the fights in sports, in business,
in politics, in the courts, among doctors and educators, in the
churches even--they all absorb the people almost to the limit of human
interest. The young man in journalism should get wise to this interest.
Whatever is nearest the heart, whatever is uppermost in mind--that is
what we want to read about. We are changeable creatures in thought, in
purpose, and in habit. The new always is fascinating. The smart editor
recognizes the love of change; accordingly he exalts the new. More than
that, he anticipates interest that is to develop, foresees changes in
government policies, the introduction of new methods, the outcome of
scientific discovery. He prepares his readers accordingly.
Man’s great interest is in his business, in his money-making.
Frequently the newspapers are of especial service to him. In many
lines of business they are a necessity. The manufacturer of goods,
for instance, searches every column for information bearing on
the raw product that enters into them, the price, the supply, the
demand, weather conditions that may influence, the condition and the
cost of transportation, the effect of legislation, the menace of
competition--anything that has influence on the making and delivery of
his product. Quick information is priceless to him.
But interest in war surpasses all other attention, as it has from
the beginning of man’s mastery over man. It is difficult to recall
any condition of human existence not affected by war. War is supreme
as an agent of destruction. It destroys not only nations and
governments, life and property, but also it blunts civilization,
coarsens refinement, stops study and progress, prevents the fulfillment
of life-cherished plans and ambitions, changes the life purpose
of millions of men. It is entirely impossible to comprehend the
multitudinous effects of war or to appreciate the condition of mind in
which a stricken people emerge from war. The study of war gives the
journalist exalted opportunity. His readers are interested in war more
than in anything else.
Some folks delight in reading criticisms of their neighbors, attacks on
public men or complaints of the conduct of mankind in general. This is
a species of jealousy that rejoices in the discomfiture of others. They
gloat over disclosures, get cynical over the downfall of public idols
and the reversals of popular beliefs. Nothing pleases them more than
to have a clergyman go astray or a church member get in jail. They
are fond of investigations. Their pinhead perceptions find nourishment
in the mistakes of others. They always take the negative side. They
question. They doubt. They lament. They scold.
It is easy for an editor to acquire this attitude. Many editors have
assumed it, beginning with the notion of catering to people who like
this sort of reading; then they gradually absorb the flavor. We have
had the examples of ill-natured newspapers nicknamed by the public the
“Growler,” or the “Scold,” or the “Old Pessimist.” Not long ago several
magazines sought fame and circulation by a conduct of criticism of
public men called muckraking. The sale of thousands of copies attested
general greed for that kind of reading. This public attitude certainly
tempts the editor; but experience has taught that the public scold is
vastly unpopular, be he editor, preacher, teacher or oracle of any sort.
And many are interested in reading about the weather. It is a universal
topic of conversation. It governs our agricultural prosperity. It
influences every kind of business. It stops the ball games. It parches
our soil, interferes with our plans, disturbs our comfort, upsets
mental processes, compels us to change our clothing when we do not
want to. It makes us wear clumsy things on our feet. It raises the
very mischief in a hundred different ways. Everybody thinks of it or
speaks of it twenty times a day. The wise editor will print a fine fat
paragraph about it, describing the weather over all this broad land,
giving the practical, the scientific reasons for its varied changes,
and explaining the indicated effect on trade, travel, and temperament.
What shall we print? A California newspaper sought through a
questionnaire to learn from its readers how much of the sheet they
actually read. It summarized the eighteen hundred replies. Seventy-five
per cent attested that the reader looked at the headlines and rarely
finished the article; only twenty-five per cent ever read an article
through. One answer said, “I go beyond the headline once in ten
times, perhaps, but when I do I read it through.” Still another, “I
usually find all I want in the first paragraph.” The net result seemed
to indicate that almost all simply scanned the sheet in search of
something to interest them, and found little. The chief criticism was
that the articles were too long.
The Paris daily publications before the war minimized the news and
in its place presented discussion and comment, sketchy description,
much fiction and literary matter. They achieved enormous circulations.
The most successful were exceedingly well written, were distinctly
literary; and they prospered greatly without the aid of news features
of the American and English journalistic sort. They were made
attractive and interesting by their excellence of workmanship.
The New York _Evening Journal_ was carried to enormous circulation by
editorial presentation rather than news exploiting. For many years
it had neither the Associated Press nor any other news association
service. Its editorial utterances attracted far reaching attention.
What news it had was emphasized by exaggeration and breathless
announcement, and typographical monstrosity.
The _Evening Sun_, which never had the Associated Press dispatches,
attained great popularity and circulation through cheerful, bright, and
witty illumination of things, and a minimum of profundity.
In a newspaper address before the Convocation of the University of the
State of New York, Mr. Don Seitz, of the New York _World_, said:
Talent was the thing in the old days, but we have gotten over
that, alas! Energy has taken the place of talent and the sudden
fact has taken the place of the news. The modern editor has been
misled somehow into using a great deal of display type to handle
the few words he uses, and at first I had the thought that this
was wrong. But somehow I have changed my mind. It is necessary
to arouse interest. The vast number of readers are rudimentary
in thought. They do not take easily to a dull solid column no
matter how interesting it may be. In trying, therefore, to catch
the largest number of readers the editor conceived the idea of
putting in larger type. It has shown what the people wanted, and
that they must have some quick way of learning what was going on,
and mind you, we have shortened up our reading time a great deal,
which is another fact.
With many people newspaper reading becomes a fixed habit. They come to
enjoy their favorite publication just as they enjoy food and sleep. It
gives them topics for thought and conversation. They become interested
in its features, in the “colyum” of fun and chat and josh that has
become so popular, in the illustrated comic strips that started with
Foxy Grandpa and have come to include Percy and Ferdie, Bringing up
Father, Mutt and Jeff, and the rest of the jolly folk. Constant reading
about them brings a feeling of personal acquaintance with them and the
habit of seeking for them. They help amazingly to draw readers and to
retain them. The newspaper habit is to be encouraged and these features
help to fix it. There can be no doubt of the popularity of the medical
column, of the puzzle department, of the question and answer feature,
and of the other like things that serve to amuse the reader.
Parents seek topics, also, that will interest the children, simple and
childlike though they be. It is amusing to note how interested older
people get in articles on important subjects written down to a child’s
understanding. Somebody is going to make a fortune sometime by printing
a children’s newspaper giving the news and the questions of the day in
language and thought that children can understand. “Grown-ups” will
appreciate it quite as much as will the youngsters.
Just how much of exaggeration and feverish language and typographical
eccentricity to inject into the sheet always puzzles the editor. He is
tempted by public demand for it, yet he does not want a reputation for
sensationalism.
The hysteria of the sensational newspaper may not be of harm to a
young person who reads it casually. But suppose she, the shop girl
for instance, acquires the habit of reading it every day. Because of
her employment, or her environment, she has not time or opportunity
to read anything else. She comes to think and to talk in its
exaggerated, inflamed, feverish language. Its typographical, breathless
announcements startle her--fill her with feverish emotions. She becomes
a pessimist, for in the sensational sheet the true, the good, the
normal are ignored. “Virtue go hang; vice is the thing that attracts
attention” is the motto. The maiden is fed on the abnormal, the
unusual, on mental monstrosities, and fancies. It influences her life.
It was said not so very long ago that ten years of cheap reading had
changed the British from the most stolid nation of Europe to the most
hysterical and theatrical. Be this as it may: habitual cheap reading
must of necessity produce cheap thinking, and cheap expression of
thought, and consequently cheap moral conduct. It is in this direction
that the sensational press and the cheap literature of the day have
their chief influence. Cheap literature produces cheap mentality and,
therefore, a cheap people.
In defense of sensationalism it is urged that you cannot arouse the
interest of the ignorant man by ordinary methods of speech. His mind is
too sluggish to comprehend it as ordinarily spoken. He can appreciate
big headlines and lurid catch words and they attract him.
I have lingered over these things in somewhat prosy manner, perhaps,
but if you are going into the newspaper business I know of little more
important than real study of what to print. The practical newspaper
man thinks of it by the hour. The good newspaper is not the product of
chance. Every phase of life is thought out and its relation to public
interest is weighed. Public interest changes almost daily. It must be
studied, must be anticipated, must be prepared for.