Triveni Journal

1927 | 11,233,916 words

Triveni is a journal dedicated to ancient Indian culture, history, philosophy, art, spirituality, music and all sorts of literature. Triveni was founded at Madras in 1927 and since that time various authors have donated their creativity in the form of articles, covering many aspects of public life....

H. W. Massingham

C. L. R. Sastri, B. Sc.

‘Antonio Stradivari has an eye
That winces at false work and loves the true.’

ROBERT BROWNING .

(1)

It is difficult to believe that Massingham is no more: difficult even now, a decade after his death. It shows the greatness, as well as the lovableness, of the man. Such spirits seem really to be immortal. Massingham was a live wire: he had what I may call eternal freshness of youth. He was not only a journalist amongst journalists: he was, also, a man among men. His soul was like a stat and dwelt apart. ‘Thou wast not born for death, immortal bird!’–thus Keats apostrophised the nightingale. We may well take a leaf from the poet’s book and say, unreservedly, of such as Massingham that they at least ought to be exempt from the calamities that assail our more ordinary selves. Comparisons may be odious. But I have no doubt that, in this ultra democratic age, it will do us immense good if, now and then, we pause to ruminate on the almost astronomical distance that separates us from those rare spirits whom a benign Providence periodically sends into our midst. The greatest of fallacies is that which informs us that all men are born equal. I have no quarrel with it except in the small (or large) detail of its being untrue to the hard facts of life. All men, unfortunately, are not born equal; and since it is the prevailing state of affairs we shall do well to salute such as are immeasurably above us–salute them as reverently as in us lies. Massingham was such a man. May he be saluted for ever!

(2)

Massingham was, first and foremost, a journalist. I may go so far even as to say that he was nothing else. He lived for journalism. He gave his all to it. It is a moot point whether it would not have gone better with him in the end, if he had not so completely identified himself with that hardest of task-mistresses. I sometimes think that it would have been splendid, both for him and for us, if he could have had the strength to cold-shoulder the dame for long spells at a time. I am appalled by the consideration of what extraordinary talents are often placed at the service of journalism–talents that are not always rewarded as they ought to be. Unless the journalist in question takes to book-writing also, his fame has little chance of surviving him, has little chance, that is, of sailing unhurt along the stream of time: being, at best, confined to his own generation. Journalism, as I have already written, is a hard task-mistress: it takes all, or almost all, from others, and gives very little in return. It is, therefore, a pity that some of the greatest intellects have given the major part of their abilities to it: to alter the words of the poet slightly, they have given up to journalism what was meant for mankind.

(3)

Massingham was not only a great journalist: he was a great editor as well; Now, this distinction is not so idiotic as it may, at first sight, appear. Every editor is a journalist: every journalist, however, is not an editor–and, what is more, cannot become even if, like Humpty Dumpty, he tries ‘with both hands.’ A great editor is a rare ave in terries: this kind cometh not out but by prayer and fasting. Massingham was not only a great editor: he was the greatest editor of his time: a time, too, when there was no lack of great editors in England. There were, for instance, C. P. Scott, J. L. Garvin, A. G. Gardiner, and J. A. Spender. But Massingham outshone all of them, even as Mount Everest out-distances its neighbouring giants, Kanchinganga and Nanga Parbat and others. He was, if I may say so, the tallest poppy among those tall poppies. Garvin, indeed, acknowledged as much in his obituary notice of him. ‘The Sicilian expedition, is it or is it not, the finest thing you ever read in your life?’–so the poet Gray asks after reading again the Seventh Book of Thucydides. A similar question may well be put in regard to Massingham’s editorship. What I mean is brought out more clearly and vividly by Mr. Shaw. He concludes his tribute to Massingham in this fashion:

‘As I write these lines comes the news of the death of our friend and contemporary, William Archer. The two vacant places seem to make a prodigious gap in the surviving front rank of late Victorian journalism. But Archer, like myself, was a journalist only, inasmuch as he wrote for the papers to boil his pot. Massingham was the perfect master journalist: the born editor without whom such pot-boiling would have been for many of us a much poorer and more sordid business. If he had left behind him a single book, it would have spoilt the integrity of his career and of his art. I hope I have made it clear that this was his triumph, and not his shortcoming. I could lay my hand more readily on ten contributors for his successor than on one successor for his contributors. A first-rate editor is a very rare bird, indeed: two or three to a generation, in contrast to swarms of authors, is as much as we get; and Massingham was the first of that very select bight.’

(4)

There is, indeed, no common ground of comparison between him and the others: you cannot, as the saying is, add four pounds of butter to four O’clock. When Massingham died, something went out of English journalism: which something, I dare to say, has not yet been replaced. The gap is still there: yawning like a chasm: Massingham was the nonpareil of editors: no wonder his place continues to be vacant. It may be true that there is nobody in this world who is, or whose services are, indispensable. In one sense, no doubt, it works out like that: the world goes on–or, rather, the work of the world goes on–though individuals disappear like rain-drops on a window-pane. But this, I think, is to take a superficial view of things. The work may go on, but what about the quality of the work? There is, certainly, a deterioration there. Sensitive souls can feel it, though they may not always be able to define it, to give it ‘a local habitation and a name.’ Mr. H. M. Tomlinson expresses it beautifully in his book, Gifts of Fortune (Heinemann). He is on the Chesil Bank, when a telegram arrives intimating the news of Conrad’s death. Mr. Tomlinson lets himself go in this wise:

‘Somehow life seems justified only by some proved friends and the achievements of good men who are still with us. Once we were so assured of the affluence and spiritual vitality of mankind that the loss of a notable figure did not seem to leave us any the poorer. But today, when it happens, we feel a distinct diminution of our light. That has been dimmed of late years by lusty barbarians, and we look now to the few manifestly superior minds in our midst to keep our faith in humanity sustained. The certainty that Joseph Conrad was somewhere in Kent was an assurance and a solace in years that have not been easily borne.’

This is fine; and it can be applied in its entirety to the loss we have sustained by the death of Massingham in August 1924. The certainty that ‘Massingham’ was somewhere in ‘London’ was an assurance and a solace in years that have not been easily borne.

(5)

Massingham is remembered chiefly by his editorship of the Daily Chronicle and the Nation. I am not competent to speak of the former. I can, however, thanks to ‘whatever gods there be,’ speak of the latter. I have–or so I fancy–some knowledge of English Weeklies: among which I have liked immensely only three: the Nation under Massingham; the Saturday Review and later, the Week-end Review–both under the editorship of Mr. Gerald Barry; and of these three the Nation under Massingham was by far the best. It ‘flamed’ if I may say so, ‘In the forehead of the morning sky.’ A great editor stamps, or imprints his personality, so to speak, upon his paper: it pervades the paper from the first page to the last. Any journalist may, and can, ‘edit’ a paper: it is only the born editor who can imbue it with his individual flavour. In this sense we can say: ‘O, the Nation! Mr. Massingham’s paper!’, ‘O, the Manchester Guardian!Mr. C. P. Scott’s paper!’ From this point of view, how many great editors does England possess now? I had better not give the answer; there would be too many wigs on the green.

Massingham, indeed, was the Nation. In this connection, I think I cannot do better than quote from Mr. H. M. Tomlinson again, who was his assistant during the last six years of his editorship.

‘It was a little distracting, at first, to meet a journalist who was punctilious and inexorable about the very commas. Massingham never relaxed while the paper was being shaped. He could see a minor fault through a month’s numbers, and grieve over it. I have some conscience myself in these matters, but I loathed it at that time, especially in an editor. ….. I thought they were of no consequence. Massingham thought they were. He would have been found recorrecting proofs if the heavens had fallen, and, being shortsighted he would have thrust the almost illegible documents at the announcing angel, unaware, in his tension, that it was the last, day. No young poet ever searched his trial efforts for what possibly might be of dubious import more closely than my new editor scrutinized the evidence and arguments of his paper, and the form in which they were to be presented. . . . And what a possession for lucky proprietors! To say they owned the Nation as the King might say he had won the Derby, or an American millionaire the finest collection of Chinese porcelain in the world! . . . There was not in the world, I used to imagine fondly, another review of quite the distinction and quality of the Nation; and certainly there was not one to equal it in its power to raise both furious enmity and grateful approval.’

And so on. I have no space here to dilate upon his actual work and upon his exquisite style. I have written this article mainly by way of an affectionate memorial–albeit belated. I got much from him: it is only right that I should do something to repay, however inadequately, those manifold services. May his name shine forever as a sort of beacon-light to guide the footsteps of aspiring journalists!

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