52
Tavistock Square
London
W.C.I.

Telephone: Museum 2621

24 July, 1929

My dear Harold,

Your questions are not altogether easy to answer,
partly in themselves, partly because one is prejudiced in
favour of anything which may bring you permanently to London.
But I will try to answer them brutally verbatim et seriatim:

1) I imagine that Beaverbrook would let you say anything pro-
vided that it did not conflict with any of his stunts of the
moment. But if he had any political stunt going, he would not
let you say anything which conflicted with it, and he might
sometimes want you to say things which helped it along. The
"policy of the paper" is a fetich the power of which no one
realizes until they have been on the staff and watched the grot-
esque witch dancing and worshipping which goes on before it
daily. The worst of Beaverbrook is that--I imagine--from
reading his papers--his fetiches are simply chameleons, which
change their colour (and shape) with violence and rapidity,
the changes being determined by the owner's object of selling
his papers.

2) I dont think really any mud would stick on you from the
Beaverbrook gang. If you edited a page in the Standard with
great success, as you certainly would, their name would be
made in the world of daily and evening newspapers, and there
would never be any difficulty of getting another job in it.
As an opening for other jobs and politics, I am not so sure.
It would depend a good deal on the kind of page it is to be.
If you are allowed a pretty free hand to write about life and
politics both seriously and amusingly, it would be all right
as regards politics and the literary and journalistic world
outside the stunt press. But if it is a page of notes and
snippets only, I have some doubts. It is difficult to say,
but I feel somehow that that might leave not mud on you, but
a little moth and rust.

I am afraid this won't help you much. I wish I could
talk it over with you--which would be easier. At any rate,
if you take it you must get a clear written guarantee (part-
icularly about the rights of both parties to determine the
agreement) from Beaverbrook. Virginia will write independently