The prison mirror. [volume] (Stillwater, Minn.) 1887-1894, 1890-09-04
Evils of Anonymous Journalism.

practiced among the English and Americans
toned in evil. 1t is falsely principled be-
cause it is unprincipleG. or without princi-
Piles; and it is conditioned in evil because it
Is wholly anonymous. At the best it's Opn-
ions are not conclusions from certain easily
verifiable principles but are effects from
the worship of certain models. They are
in so far quite worthless, for it is the very
nature of things that the original mind can
not conform to models; it has it's norm
within itself; it can work only in it's own
way, and by its self-given laws. Criticism
does not inquire whether a work is true to
life. but tacitly or explicitly compares it
| with models and tests it by them. If liter
| airy travelled by any such road as criticism
would have it 60, it would travel in vi
cious circle, and would arrive only at the
point Of departure. Yet this is the course
that criticism must always prescribe, when
it attempts to give laws. Being itself ar
| tlflclal it cannot conceive of the original ex-
cept as the abnormal 1t must altogether
| reconceive its Office before it can be of use
to literature. 1t must reduce this to the bust
ness of observing, recording, and compar-
ing; and to Analysing the material before it,
and then sYnthetizing it's impressions.
Even then. it is not too much to say that
| literature as an art could get on perfectly
well without it. just as many good novels.
poems. plays, essays, sketches, would be
written it there were no such thing as crit
| lclSm III the literary world, and no more
bad ones. But it will be long before the
criticism ceases to imagine itself control
ling force, to give itself airs of sovereignty,
| and to issue DEGREES. AS it exists it is
mostly mischief, though not the greatest
mischief; but it may be greatly ameliorated
In character and Softened in manner by the
total abolition of anonymity. We have no
hesitation in saying that anonymous criti-
cism is almost wholly an abuse. and we do
not conflne our meaning here to literary
criticism. Now that nearly every aspect
and nook and corner of life is searched by
print. it is intolerably oppressive that any
department of current literature, or of the
phase of literature we. call journalism,
| should be anonymous. Every editorial,
every smallest piece of reporting, that in
wolves personal matter. should be signed by
the writer, who should be personally re-
spOnsible for his words. In free country
where no one can suffer for his opinions,
no one has right to make another suffer
by them more condemnation than his indi-
vidual name can carry. Thanks to the in
terviewer, the society reporter, and the spe-
cial correspondent, the superstitiOus awe in
which print has been held is fast vanishing;
but print still bears too great authority. If
each piece of it were signed by the author,
its false advantage would be diSspated.
We believe that journalists generally have
| far more conscience in dealing with events
than they are credited with; but we are
afraid that they have also less. This was
some time paradox, but the situation it
suggests would pass with the temptations
and privileges hedging in the man who
shoots from the dark at man in the light
There ought not to be any such thing as
Journalistic authority which can continue in
equal force through all the changes of per-
sonnet in the journalistic management, and
can be handed on from just and upright
man to mean and cruel and vindictive
man, and still carry to the reader the weight
of great Journals name. If every inter-
view was signed, so that the public might
understand that it was relying upon the &C.
curacy and honesty of this or that reporter,
and not upon the good faith of the journal
whose management can have no means of
verifying the interview, the interviewer
would cease to represent anything but him
self; and if he were held directly and per-
sOnally responsible, it would be much to
the health of his own soul, and the advan-
tage of the public. AS it is he is supposed |
to represent the journal that employs him.
and the management is from time to time
obliged to endorse or disclaim him. He is
called, in his own language, the Times rep
resentative, or the Sun representative, or
the World representative, but as matter of |
fact he represents nothing but himself. He
can represent nothing else; and no writer of |
leading articles in any journal can represent |
anything more. Journalistic entity is |
blameful fiction, a mask which ought to be |
torn from the features of the Browns,