The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1922-10-12
ON SECOND THOUGHT
BY JAY y. HOUSE
(From Philadelphia Public LsdsssJ

We often wonder why the people
who do it want to argue with us.
They nearly always start from the
premise that we're an ignoramus;
all of those things. and we may very
well be, why should anybody take
the vaporings and the imbecilities that
appear herein so seriously as to at
tempt their combination?
"They got your goat three times re-
Gently" cachinnates T. 7. H. as he
writhes in commissions of laughter. We
take the position that the trained~writ-
ing-man who permits an unskilled
contributor to get his goat in his own
column isn't worth a giggie. to say
nothing of prolonged laughter. I'm
,, your column" writes I. p. S., ''you
have a striking opportunity" And
then he goes on to intimate that we
are not living up to it.
We are not so sure of that. We've
got lot of people wondering whether
there is an Adelaide. An even greater
number are curious as TO whether
we're a basso or a tenor. In coal
town upstate where we recently ap-
peared in the guise of an after-dinner
| speaker they had us classified as a
tenor. The audience was greatly Sur
prised to discover we're basso.
| In some of the mail on the desk.
and particularly in the letters from
which we have just quoted, are la
/ bored references to the 'high-class
| journalism for which the people are
supposed to yearn. We think we
know what the people want in q news
paper, but we doubt it would be CLASH
! fled as .high-class journalism" by
those who voluntarily establish the
metes and bounds. We think the
! people want, first, to know exactly
4 n ot ffor hot .
it codified and interpreted.
Our own notion is that a news
| paper should reflect life and it's ac-
/ tivities accurately and without heat.
After that it should comment on such
| topics as are of enough interest to
| justify comment, frankly and good
humoredly.<N Not all of the truth about
any given news topic can be printed
or should be printed. The canons OF
1 good taste, decency, fairness and JUS
tice forbid. But SO far as newspaper
goes in printing the news of any in
cident, that which it prints should
be the exact truth. A good deal of
life and its activities is commonplace;
not a little of it is sordid and pitiabIe.
But failure to reflect the common
place. the sordid and the pitiable is
not "high-class'' journalism it is class
journalism-an appeal to a constitu-
ency so small in numbers as to be al
most negligible.
4 Our notion of low-class journalism
is that expressed in newspapers which
deliberately play upon the passions
and prejudices of their readers, and
which, in order to fire or shape public
sentiment, cunningly over-write, I'M
der-state. twist or misrepresent the
sort of journalism. The fathead de-
mands his poison. and there is always
somebody constituencies enough to
supply it.
| Gosh, that was a long speech. We're
glad we shan't have to make it again
for three or four months.
/ Calling the Roll.
4 Sir-Is there room on your book
shelf. .whereon 'If Winter Comes" is
featured, for The Swiss Family Rob,
mSotsres Sanford nj 1lao and MertGn h
Peddler," Mark the Matchboy." 1.-The
thoress of "Macaria"; "st. Elmo
and one or two selected works from
the pen of Mrs. E. D. N. Southwark
and Caroline Lee Hentz? Helen,
Babies" you have of course. And
doubtless. Mr.. Cozzens. Sparrow
grass Papers, and Max Adeler's "Out
! of the Hurley Burnley" And, perhaps
the lucubrations of Artemus Ward
who. like you, was a most amoosin
cuss. JOHN PHOENIX.
We have what we take to be as
fine a collection of uninteresting trash
as any small performer on the lit
erary circuit. 1t is well within the
realm of plausible conjecture that the
books mentioned may be included ir
it. We runmage the bookshelf only
to take out and throw away an old
piece of trash to make room for one
: of more recent printing. A man who
keeps the plots of sixteen or seventeen
serial stories in his mind all-the time
has little leisure or inclination to read
more books.
Anyway, reading ones own books is
a thriftless proceeding. 1t just wears
II them out, leaving nothing to show for
I the money invested.