Please allow me to begin by thanking the committee of the Queen's English Society, for inviting me to its annual general meeting and for an excellent lunch. I did write ``excellent'' before lunch, as it happens, but it lived up to the adjective. The origins of the invitation are quite interesting and wholly relevant to the society's work and aims. I shall come to those origins a little later.
You will not be surprised to hear that the people who work in the newsroom of The Daily Telegraph, perhaps in common with most groups of employees, have their mischievous moments. When word spread that I was to address you today, it provoked more than a little insolent comment. You see, to my colleagues _ I was going to say younger colleagues but these days, sadly, that would be tautologous _ my title is not really executive news editor, however clearly those words appear on my business card. To them, I am the pedant-in-chief.
In the eyes of the Queen's English Society, this is quite possibly the most attractive of compliments. Not so to my friends at the Telegraph. Instead it is a source of great amusement that someone with so much else to do should devote extravagant amounts of time to badgering them about what we call house style, that is to say The Daily Telegraph's preferred way of expressing itself to the world.
There is a second reason for my colleagues' response: in their company, I am something of an oddity. I was not educated privately but at a secondary modern school. I did not attend ANY university, let alone a good one. If I am to be completely honest, and I do not blame anyone else for this, I was a decidedly poor pupil throughout my school career and these days feel a profound sense of shame when I reflect on wasted academic opportunies.
Perhaps this lies behind my second reason for being so determined to ensure that what appears in the Telegraph news pages is written as elegantly as possible, conforming to our house style and the laws of grammar, as well as being accurate and informative. My philosophy, which is also inspired by thoughts about my background, is simple: if I am able to get it right most of the time, or at least try to do so, then everyone else should, too.
This brings me back to my starting point: your society's invitation to me to join you today.
Towards the end of last year, we received a short communication from Anne Shelley, your vice-president. Many more letters are sent to the Telegraph than we ever have room to print. Whenever possible, the letters editor will reduce his or, as is the case at present, her burden by passing on items to other people around the building so that they can deal directly with the matters raised. Often, I am seen as such a person, especially where the correspondence concerns relatively minor complaints that do not require the attention of the editor or, more ominously, the lawyers but can usefully be resolved by a polite exchange of letters.
I hope that Anne Shelley will forgive me for suggesting that her letter fell into this category. On November 26 2002, she had innocently opened her copy of the Telegraph to read with horror an article headlined `The girls
who drink until they drop'. The report began: One in 10 women has drunk themselves unconscious, according to a survey that confirms the ``girls behaving badly syndrome''.
This is what Mrs Shelley wrote: ``The effect of your serious and rather alarming article was somewhat spoilt by the opening sentence. I realise that `his or her' has been superseded by `they' but as the gender of the
subject is known, surely you could have writen `One in ten has drunk herself unconscious'. Why not use correct grammar and more elegant English if it does not involve pandering to political correctness or other modern trends whuch are considered `acceptable'?''
I DROPPED THIS NEXT PARAGRAPH: Incidentally, the introduction was incorrect in another respect.......the reporter's statement that the survey ``confirms the `girls behaving badly' syndrome''. Surveys, by and large, do not confirm anything at all. Those who conduct them make assertions and draw conclusions, and even these are occasionally self-serving. We are surely entitled to feel suspicious, for example, if a survey commissioned by the National Union of Railwaymen came out in favour of trains*.
Now this was not, as I am sure most of you will know, the first occasion on which Anne Shelley had taken issue with a newspaper's incorrect use of English. I read her letter and replied _ here I rely on memory _ in the following terms: ``Thank you for taking the trouble to write. I completely agree with you. The introduction to the story should have been written as you suggest, or been changed by the sub-editor.''
I really saw nothing unusual in the nature of my response. To Mrs Shelley, so accustomed to smart-alec or lazy dismissal of her efforts to prevent assaults on the English language, my words came as a revelation.
A few weeks later, the journalist whose prose had caused the initial offence came to me with a heartwarming story. She had been helping out on the telephones during our annual phone-in to raise money for the Telegraph Christmas Charity Appeal. The person sitting beside her had taken a call from Anne Shelley. She had made a very generous donation to the appeal, explaining that this was her way of thanking us for our conciliatory
response. We can learn two lessons from this episode. One, which should hardly need emphasis, is that courtesy costs nothing and can bring rewards.
The other is that not even a newspaper that likes to place itself among the finest in the English-speaking world is above making mistakes.
I have always argued that when one considers the speed and complexity of national newspaper production, the wonder is not that we make so many errors but that we make so few. The other side of that coin, it seems to
me, is that when we get something wrong _ be it an error of fact, or one of grammar _ we should be big enough to acknowledge it.
I can assure you that Charles Moore, the Editor of The Daily Telegraph, is extremely vigilant on such matters. His daily conference for heads of department commences, without fail, with an appraisal of that morning's
newspaper. To be a fly on the wall at one of his conferences, ladies and gentlemen, would be such an uplifting experience for members of this society that the Telegraph should seriously consider holding a special auction for places, the proceeds to go to the 2003 Christmas appeal.
One of Charles's qualities is an ability to give the impression that he has read every word of each day's newspaper. He expresses himself with great elegance but also some restraint, even when he has noticed the most irritating of errors or, worse still, the re-appearance of a mistake about which he has previously complained. ``In my never-ending campaign,'' he will begin, ``to persuade everyone to be careful about words that sound as if they are correct but are, in fact, not.......''. Then, he will read out a quite appalling example: testament when the writer meant testimony _ which appeared this week _ or disinterested for uninterested, flounder for founder. ``Please can we also try to remember,'' he will plead, ``that infer and imply do not mean the same thing, and neither do refute and deny.''
In passing, I should say that dictionary compilers seem determined to undermine the Editor's cause. Some, at least, allow refute to mean deny, albeit as a secondary definition. As a young reporter I was taught that post-mortem was always an adjective, never a noun, and therefore needed to be followed by the word examination. Then a colleague pointed out to me, with some glee, that dictionaries make no such distinction. Was the rule changed, unknown to me? Or was I misinformed all those years ago?
Often, ugly or annoying words and phrases creep into everyday use after one or two high-profile mentions. I was delighted when the editor tired, very quickly, of the references to wake-up calls that began to litter so many articles after the events of September 11, 2001. I look forward to a similar ruling soon on Mr Gilligan's unsolicited gift of ``sexing-up'' to contemporary English usage.
During those Editor's conferences, I listen intently to his observations, and frequently make them the subject of reminders to be circulated in the newsroom. It is true to say that the response to my messages on style and grammar ranges from affected derision to grudging respect, whether I am passing on the Editor's views or making an observation or ruling of my own.
This causes me no offence provided my colleagues try at least to take notice of the points being made. Some of the issues raised have more to do with the Telegraph's style book than, strictly speaking, matters of particular concern to you, although I expect that our views often coincide.
Often, but not always: our style on titles, for example, is to refer always to barons and baronesses as Lord Thisname and Lady Thatname, except upon the first announcement of their baronies. If it is of any consolation to your absent president, I should add that this is an easy rule to forget, and that it frequently IS forgotten.
We all have our betes noires. Mine is that grotesque tabloid device of placing someone's job title, or another descriptive word or phrase, before his or her name, without trace of definite or indefinite article.....................shamed minister Fred Brown........ EastEnders actress Sally Smith........... police chief John White..........crazed speechmaker Colin Randall. I have lost count of the number of times I have promised reporters that they will be among the first to know if the Telegraph decides to go tabloid. I am not helped in my campaign by the fact that certain other departments disregard a rule so fundamental that it appears on the first page of the style book.
My most recent request to staff ended with these words: ``Daily Telegraph style is routinely ignored by large sections of the paper and I know that its continued influence on the news pages, home and foreign, seems
anachronistic to some of you. But it is what gives our part of the paper its distinctive _ and superior _ character and we should all do our best to observe it.''
We do not pretend, of course, to operate in isolation of the outside world. We are journalists not professors, producing newspapers not text books, and whether we like it or not our language is a developing one. It seems strange to think back 20 years or so to a comment by Lord Hartwell, then our proprietor, that the Telegraph's style had been allowed to become a little racier. I am acutely conscious of an increasingly relaxed approach and I share what I suspect are your misgivings about this development.
Even so, I do hope that in this short talk I have persuaded you of our broad commitment to objectives upon which I know we can all agree: to promote and uphold the use of good English and to encourage the enjoyment of the language. Now, where have I seen those words before?
The forces ranged against us are formidable. What on earth drove the leadership of the Secondary Heads' Association, of all bodies, to decide that its title needed no possessive apostrophe? I make no apology for my remedy, which is to impose one at every opportunity. My wife, who is French, is horrified by the standard of spelling in this country, sometimes even among professional people.
When I sat down to write this speech, I privately gave it the working title, Confessions of a Pedant. I am not sure that I have necessarily lived up to that self-billing. I am, in my own way, a pedant, but feel I have little to confess. I hope that my colleagues regard my interventions as helpful, not those of a bully. I do not present myself to them, and I certainly do not present myself to you, as one whose own written or spoken English is beyond reproach. Readers, fellow journalists and others have taken ME to task more than once. I accept full responsibility for each flattened vowel, any grammatical lapse and all flawed logic.
For my closing thought, however, I wish to depart slightly from my chosen theme, while staying with newspapers. As you might expect, I believe passionately in the freedom of the press. I also believe that despite its shortcomings, the press is good for democracy.
Others have covered these points with more eloquence. In his play Night and Day, Tom Stoppard wrote the following, marvellous lines to be uttered by one of his main characters after she had listened, without interruption, to a young journalist's lengthy monologue on the same lofty principles.
``Oh,'' she replied when, at last, he stopped speaking. ``I am absolutely with you on the freedom of the press. It's the bloody newspapers I can't stand.
* In the version preserved by the QES, the dropped paragraph was broken after "National Union........" and I guessed the missing part of the sentence. A friend who had his own copy in his e-mail inbox enables me to correct the reference, which should read: "National Union of Students came out in favour of higher grants and free beer."
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