Graham Stewart
A Hack Without Influence
Diplomat Without Portfolio: Valentine Chirol, His Life and The Times
By Linda B Fritzinger
I B Tauris 567pp £24.50 order from our bookshop
Why is there a market for biographies of hacks? After all, relatively little journalism is of sufficient literary merit to survive beyond the immediate context of the news it concerns. It being some years since a directive was issued prohibiting the wrapping of fish and chips in newsprint, it is surely time a more up-to-date phrase was coined to describe the fate of newspaper prose; but whatever the eventual expression, the sentiment will stay the same.
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