New Statesman
The Week-end Review
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VOL. LXIII • No. 1848 — MONDAY • 19 SEPTEMBER 1966 — NINEPENCE
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A LETTER FROM THE EDITOR
Goodbye from Parris Marr
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EXCEPTING, perhaps, the positions I held within government after having been elected to the shadow cabinet, I would be claiming for myself a far too inflated sense of foresight were I to say that I had expected to do any particular job in my life so far. Nearly thirty years ago, when I went up to university, I had, at best, vague ambitions of public service, whether in the old-fashioned sense of Parliament and the Bar, or in a newer and, although I hate to say it, more self-important sense of otherwise helping the grand cause of English Liberalism. Editing the New Statesman has been no exception.
When seven years ago I was confirmed as editor by the writing staff, I felt a trepdidation mercifully rare in my life. Taking over from the gargantuan presence of Kinglsey Martin as this publication's fourth editor, I was more concerned with not being the one to take his eye off the ball than with any aspirations of advancing the Statesman. My fears were soon quashed by my vastly talented colleagues, some of whom I had worked with as a writer for many years already, others new acquaintances and soon friends. I was taken out for lunch after my appointment by a rival editor who remarked enviously halfway through dessert that, whilst if he ever took the day off he would come back to find twelve differences of opinion plastered across the front page, were I to take a day off then in all likelihood the New Statesman offices themselves would be able to produce an issue and no-one would notice.
He was quite right. Although there has been a great deal of transformation since I took over in 1959, the spirit of the New Statesman as a trusted and articulate defender and promoter of radical thought in this country remains. This can be seen echoed not only in landmark achievements like the Manifesto for a Humane Society and, more recently, Outrage in an Era of Good Times, but in every other issue we've produced. I think I can say that the ball hasn't been ripped yet.
What has changed? Compared with seven years ago, the Statesman itself is expanded along with its readership: the literary and cultural pages, conceived and edited by my successor as editor Anthony Burgess, draw in thousands of readers every week with their astute and warm analysis of the artistic life of Britain. Overall circulation now is higher than it has ever been, over one-hundred thousand copies sold every Monday. Many of these new readers are young adults galvanised by an unbending faith in Britain's capacity for self-improvement. All are loyal, intelligent people whose various correspondences it had been a joy to receive and read in the letters pages each week.
I also like to think that the Statesman has become more open in the last decade to giving a platform to dissenting voices. Many of our greatest social critics, as well as most eloquent contributors, have not necessarily been ones to tread the socialist line. As CP Scott wrote in his lecture upon The Guardian's centenary: Comment is free, but facts are sacred. Although I would never wish to steal so blatantly from the soul a rival, I think Mr. Scott's words are some that all of us in publishing can readily take on board. In expanding our base of writers, I have aimed to do just that.
But a magazine or a newspaper must never become simply a bully-pulpit for its editor. In this position there is great power – and great potential for abuse of that power. With control over the message we deliver to our readership and to the country, it is vital that it never reach the stage where it is a personal crusade, or where disagreements in opinion are anything other than cherished. It would be naive to suggest after seven years that my own views on various topics have not, through my own editorials, come to be associated with the Statesman – but no more, I believe, than those of any other contributor. We writers simply pass through the halls of ancient institutions. We can add our voices in the present, but it would be arrogant to expect them to stick past then.
Therefore, I wish to thank you all, profusely. All writers, all readers and all other colleagues. In your own ways, you have all been invaluable and deeply cherished. I have no doubts that you will be anything else to Anthony Burgess, in whose more-than-capable hands I now leave you.
