Journalism for Women | Page 2

the next morning. The difference will be little less than miraculous. Yet the bored observer of the previous night will find in the printed article no discrepancies, no insidious departures from sober fact; and as he reads it, the conviction will grow upon him that his own impressions were wrong, and that after all a debate in the House of Commons is a remarkably amusing and delightful entertainment. If the newspapers ceased to report the proceedings of Parliament, the uncomfortable benches of the Strangers' Gallery would for ever remain empty, simply because the delusion which now fills them nightly during the session would die for lack of sustenance. Again, take the case of the amiable feminine crowds which collect upon the Mall whenever Her Majesty holds a Drawing Room at Buckingham Palace. What has induced them to forsake lunch and the domestic joys in order to frequent that draughty thoroughfare? Nothing but accounts which they have read in vivacious newspapers of the sights to be seen there on these state occasions. They go; they see; they return fatigued and privately disappointed, with a vague feeling that some one has misled them. But with the arrival later in the afternoon of the vendor of special editions, they begin to be reassured. Under the heading "To-day's Drawing Room," they encounter a description of incidents which they themselves have witnessed. The sweet thought crosses their minds: "Perhaps that was written by the curious woman with eye-glasses who stood near to me;" and by the time dinner is over nothing would persuade them that the Mall on Drawing Room day is not one of the most interesting places in the world.
So the journalist continues to gain a livelihood by forcing his rosy fallacies upon the weary world.
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In order to substantiate further the proposition that the art of journalism is the art of lending interest to people and events intrinsically dull, let me draw attention to the treatment accorded by editors to those rare trifles of information which by general agreement are not in themselves dull. Such an item, a jewel of its kind, was the following: I copy it as it was allowed to appear in an evening newspaper justly renowned for enterprise, talent, and imagination, under date 16th January, 1897:
"While walking in the Park at Tsarskoe Selo the Tsar beckoned to a gardener. The man hastened to obey, but a guard, thinking he was running up to attack the Emperor, shot him dead.
"His Majesty was deeply affected by the occurrence."
Observe the stark nakedness of it. There is no decorative treatment here, no evidence of an attempt to impress upon the report the individuality of the paper. The Editor rightly divined that the simple, splendid tragedy of the event offered no opportunity for a display of his art. His art, indeed, could have nothing to do with it. If all news were of a similar quality, the art of journalism, as it exists at present, would instantly expire, and a new art would arise to take its place, though what the nature of that new art would be, it is hazardous to guess. One may, however, assert that journalism in its highest development will only thrive so long and so far as the march of events continues, in the eyes of the majority, to be a dull, monotonous and funereal procession. The insensible hack may trust himself to present attractively an occurrence or a man that all the world concedes to be inherently attractive; but it needs a heaven-born artist, trained in the subtleties of his craft and gifted with the inexhaustible appreciative wonder of a child, to deal finely and picturesquely with, say, bi-metallism or the Concert of Europe.
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And how to create interest where interest is not? Alas, no dissertation and no teacher can answer the question. As in other arts, so in journalism, the high essentials may not be inculcated. It is the mere technique which is imparted. By a curious paradox, the student is taught, of art, only what he already knows. Anyone can learn to write, and to write well, in any given style; but to see, to discern the interestingness which is veiled from the crowd--that comes not by tuition; rather by intuition.
The best treatise on art can only hope:--
(1) To indicate the lines of study and training which should be pursued in order to acquire the measure of mechanical accomplishment necessary to the right using of the artistic faculty.
(2) If the artistic faculty exists but is dormant, to awaken it by means of suggestion; and having awakened it, to show how it may be properly excited to the fullest activity of which it is capable.
This book is an attempt to do these things, for women, in the art of journalism.
Chapter