I have been reading a little book called How to Write for the
Press. Other books which have been published upon the same
subject are How to Be an Author, How to Write a Play, How to
Succeed as a Journalist, How to Write for the Magazines, and How
to Earn £600 a Year with the Pen. Of these the last-named has, I
think, the most pleasing title. Anybody can write a play; the
trouble is to get it produced. Almost anybody can be an author;
the business is to collect money and fame from this state of
being. Writing for the magazines, again, sounds a delightful
occupation, but literally it means nothing without the co-
operation of the editors of the magazines, and it is this co-
operation which is so difficult to secure. But to earn £600 a
year with the pen is to do a definite thing; if the book could
really tell the secret of that, it would have an enormous sale. I
have not read it, so I cannot say what the secret is. Perhaps it
was only a handbook on forgery.
How to Write for the Press disappointed me. It is concerned not
with the literary journalist (as I believe he is called) but with
the reporter (as he is never called, the proper title being
"special representative"). It gives in tabular form a list of the
facts you should ascertain at the different functions you attend;
with this book in your pocket there would be no excuse if you
neglected to find out at a wedding the names of the bride and
bridegroom. It also gives--and I think this is very friendly of
it--a list of useful synonyms for the principal subjects, animate
and inanimate, of description. The danger of calling the
protagonists at the court of Hymen (this one is not from the
book; I thought of it myself just now)--the danger of calling
them "the happy pair" more than once in a column is that your
readers begin to suspect that you are a person of extremely
limited mind, and when once they get this idea into their heads
they are not in a proper state to appreciate the rest of your
article. But if in your second paragraph you speak of "the joyful
couple," and in your third of "the ecstatic brace," you give an
impression of careless mystery of the language which can never be
shed away.
Among the many interesting chapters is one dealing with contested
elections. One of the questions to which the special
representative was advised to find an answer was this: "What
outside bodies are taking active part in the contest?" In the bad
old days--now happily gone for ever--the outside bodies of dead
cats used to take an active and important part in the contest,
and as the same body would often be used twice the reporter in
search of statistics was placed in a position of great
responsibility. Nowadays, I suppose, he is only meant to concern
himself with such bodies as the Coal Consumers' League and the
Tariff Reform League, and there would be no doubt in the mind of
anybody as to whether they were there or not.
I am afraid I should not be a success as "our special
representative." I should never think of half the things which
occur to the good reporter. You read in your local paper a
sentence like this: "The bride's brother, who only arrived last
week from Australia, where he held an important post under the
Government, and is about to proceed on a tour through Canada
with--curiously enough--a nephew of the bride-groom, gave her
away." Well, what a mass of information has to be gleaned before
that sentence can be written. Or this. "The hall was packed to
suffocation, and beneath the glare of the electric light--
specially installed for this occasion by Messrs. Ampère & Son of
Pumpton, the building being at ordinary times strikingly
deficient in the matter of artificial lighting in spite of the
efforts of the more progressive members of the town council--the
faces of not a few of the fairer sex could be observed." You
know, I am afraid I should have forgotten all that. I should
simply have obtained a copy of the principal speech, and prefaced
it with the words," Mr. Dodberry then spoke as follows"; or, if
my conscience would not allow of such a palpable misstatement,
"Mr. Dodberry then rose with the intention of speaking as
follows."
In the more human art of interviewing I should be equally at
fault. The interview itself would be satisfactory, but I am
afraid that its publication would lead people to believe that all
the best things had been said by me. To remember what anybody
else has said is easy; to remember, even five minutes after, what
one has said oneself is almost impossible. For to recall YOUR
remarks in our argument at the club last night is simply a matter
of memory; to recall MINE, I have to forget all that I meant to
have said, all that I ought to have said, and all that I have
thought upon the subject since.
In fact, I begin to see that the successful reporter must
eliminate his personality altogether, whereas the successful
literary journalist depends for his success entirely upon his
personality --which is what is meant by "style." I suppose it is
for this reason that, when the literary journalist is sent as
"our extra-special representative" to report a prize fight or a
final cup tie or a political meeting, the result is always
appalling. The "ego" bulges out of every line, obviously
conscious that it is showing us no ordinary reporting, determined
that it will not be overshadowed by the importance of the
subject. And those who are more interested in the matter than in
the manner regard him as an intruder, and the others regret that
he is so greatly overtaxing his strength.
So each to his business, and his handbook to each--How to Write
for the Press to the special representative, and How to Be an
Author to the author. There is no book, I believe, called How to
Be a Solicitor, or a doctor or an admiral or a brewer. That is a
different matter altogether; but any fool can write for the
papers.