Every so often I get an email from someone who edits the letters page of a daily newspaper. I’m going to mention no names. Usually it appears in the middle of the night, and it marks the start of a series of tiny revisions that I find quite fascinating.

When I’m editing the letters for the magazine, I generally try and do very little to them so that what appears on the page is more or less an identical reproduction of what was sent in, just with the spelling and grammar put right, and sometimes with a little bit chopped off to make it more concise. This paper, though, makes a lot of changes, and often asks for minor rewrites along the way.

The most recent exchange went like this:

From: ______
To: nik@nikplus.com

This is ____ emailing from ___ - Happy New Year. After you kindly sent me your comments on 007 and Daniel Craig last autumn, would you be interested in looking at a piece we ran on Truman Capote last week and potentially writing a response? I see from your archived blog files you’re a Capote fan too! Please let me know if you might like to.

So I replied and said I’d do it. The article they’d run duly came through, I read it and I knocked out a response:

From: nik@nikplus.com
To: _____

The claim that Truman Capote’s investigation of Dick Hickock and Perry Smith in In Cold Blood was prejudiced by unwarranted sexual feelings for Smith should not be surprising to anyone who lives in the modern age. While journalists will claim that they maintain a detached interest in the subjects about which they write, they often cannot help but make the news themselves, a prime example being one US TV network’s claim of an election victory for Bush before all the votes had been counted. For some time it looked as though that editorial decision itself would have been enough to see him in the Oval Office, even without the votes he needed.

It’s true you do feel sympathy for Smith and revulsion for Hickock by the end of the book, but if the reader is unable to recognise that these two men committed a heinous crime and that a fact-based novel cannot fail to be influenced by the biases of the writer is naive indeed.

Modern-day book-based journalism rarely rises above the slew of poorly written holiday memoirs masquerading as travelogues. Compare these to In Cold Blood and you will see that, whatever Capote’s alleged personal feelings for one of his subjects, it remains a masterpiece 40 years after its completion.

Nik

An hour later, a reply:

From: _____
To: nik@nikplus.com

Thankyou very much - that’s great. Would you consider adding an example of the kind of modern book-based journalism you think is a mere travelogue, and a brief comment on how Capote’s style of writing makes him great?

Bugger. That’s exactly what I didn’t want to happen.

To: _____
From: nik@nikplus.com

I’d rather not name anyone specific as far as the travel journalism goes, although the most obvious candidate is Michael Palin. I’m a great fan of his programmes (have all the DVDs) and love the accompanying books, but they don’t really offer much insight into the people he meets or the way they live.

As for Capote’s writing style, how about:

‘Capote wrote with an extraordinary confidence, such that there is great economy in his words. Barely a single one could be cut without changing his meaning, resulting in a clarity often absent from the flabby, self-indulgent pulp of the modern era.’

(I don’t suppose your book review people want any new reviewers, do they…?)

Best regards
Nik

Later that evening:

To: nik@nikplus.com
From: _____

Thankyou very much for that - one more request, could we name Fox (and if needed any other channel) for declaring for Bush too early in 2000? I think it’s relevant and important to point it out.

I replied to say that that was fine, if indeed it was Fox. The next day, it appeared in the paper, very much focused on the extra bits I’d been guided to write, which always makes me wonder why papers don’t just make up their letters and put random names on the end:

When reporters get too involved

ED COLLEY’S claim that Truman Capote compromised his journalistic integrity ‘whichever way you look at it’ in his documentary novel In Cold Blood about two suspected killers because of his sexual feelings for one of tjem should not be surprising to anyone living in the modern media age.

While journalists and media networks claim that they maintain a detached interest in their subjects, they often can’t help but make the news themselves.

A famous recent example of this is Fox News’s claim of an election victory for Bush in 2000 before all the votes had been counted; for some time it looked as though that editorial decision itself would have been enough to see Bush in the Oval Office, even without the votes he needed.

Furthermore, modern-day journalistic books rarely rise above the slew of poorly written holiday memoirs masquerading as reportage.

Compare these to In Cold Blood and you would still reach for the Capote every time.

Nik Rawlinson, nikplus.com

I don’t mind the changes - they make for a nice concise letter - but I do find the backwards-forwards editing dance quite amusing when the reader probably thinks that they’re reading close to raw copy.

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