HOW THE PRESS VIEWS ITSELF.

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 1891, 28 October 1913, Page 11

HOW THE PRESS VIEWS ITSELF.

CRITICISM OF AN EDITOR'S VIEW. "INTELLECTUAL BANKRUPTCY." Tho address which Mr. Robert Donald, the editor of the ' 'Daily Chronicle," recontly delivered in England, as j president of the Institute,, of Journal- . ists (and roprinted in The Dominion some days ago), has called forth an in- ; tercsting discussion in the Homo newspapers. Money-Making Epoch. "What affects us at present," says the "Acadomy," "is the remarkable in- ' tellectual bankruptcy of the Press of today, duo to tho fact that the majority of tho papers aro run by clever organisers wliose 6010 business it is to seo that their concerns make money. The last decade witnossed tho complete ruiii of at least three journals,- once respected for their literary excellence. Two of them carried weight in the world of criticism until the vision of a huge halfponny-publio overcame their managers and made their opinions and articles worth about tho price of the piper; the third was written 'by gentlemen for gentlemen,', and has degenerated into a chaos of headlines and topical hash." "The nowspapers that are most obviously fighting a losing battle aro those that aro pitifully trying to do in 1913 what the founder of Carmelite Houso was doing in 1903, or was planning to begin in 1893. Or, to put it in one word, the most successful of the halfpenny dailies has become fundamentally an old-fashioned paper. _ And that mainly is the reason why it is' the despair of its competitors," says the "Now Statesman." _ • "The history of journalism holds no record of catastrophe parallel to that which accompanied tho 'modernising' of a great Tory journal. Colossal revenues, as we know, havo in a few instances boen earned by modorn newspapers, singly or in ' groups; but there does not now exist a single daily which can show a salaries list for its editorial staff and special contributors and a profit for its proprietors comparsblo with that of a typical penny paper in tho severities and eighties." "Men of high intellectual attainment aro slow to commit themselves to a profession in which the prizes are few .and securo places difficult to find," says the "Westminster Gazette." "It is truo that tho modern newspaper contains more occasional articles than its predecessor, but these for the most part aro written not by professional, journalists, but by authors and experts, who make tho chief part of their living by other means." "Oligarchical Government." "When the Press of a country passes into tho hands of a few people we see tho first step taken towards oligarchical government," says the "Spectator." "It would be well if we could feel that forewarned is forearmed. But in the present indifference of public opinion it is impossible to feel any certainty that wo shall profit by tho warning. If the newer journalism is preferable to the old 'from the point of view of tho reading public,' it promises to bo infinitely worse from tho point of view of the thinking public." "Truth" calls attention to a notable omission on tho part of the Press.' Its comment is a useful P.S. to Mr. Hogge's artiolo on the way in which tho Press reports Parliament: "The King gave his Royal Assent to over 200 Bills before Parliament rose. This portentous fact reminds me of tho perplexity of a simple-minded man who honestly belioved that he should bo acquainted with the laws under which ho lived. Hearing that there had been an ' orgy of Royal Assents in the Upper Houso, ho bought a morning paper in order to discover at least the titles of the new statutes. "Ho went from §d. to Id,, and from Id. to 2d!, but could not even obtain a complete list of tho measures. To this ' day ho is in ignorance of the iniquities porpetratcd by tho Parliament- which is supposed to govern in his name, and very probably lio will one day find himself in prison for unwittingly offending against some Provisional Order, which nobody has read, except a Parliamentary solicitor and Mr. John Burrts's private secretary."