Appendix: on Reviewing – and Being Reviewed
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Appendix: On Reviewing – and Being Reviewed As anyone knows who has tried their hand suffi ciently at both activities, it is a great deal easier to review books on history than it is to write them. Even the most turgid and mediocre volume about the past is likely to show traces of expertise, curiosity, stamina, empathy and creativity – qualities that are sometimes conspicuously lacking in historical reviews, and in historical reviewers. But since reviews are quick, short and cheap, whereas books are by comparison slow, long and expensive, they are often thought to exert an immediate infl uence out of all proportion to their length and merit. Such, at least, are the opinions of all literary editors, some publishers, and most authors – and of many reviewers themselves. Of course, they would say that, wouldn’t they? But whether they are right or wrong, it cannot be denied that for the best part of two hundred years, since the launching of the Edinburgh Review in 1802, history reviews and history reviewing have been an integral part of the public and academic culture of Britain. Whether we know it or not, like it or not, or are intimidated by it or not, those of us who turn our hands to this task are standing and scribbling in a direct line of succession which reaches back to the young Macaulay, who fi rst made his public reputation as a coruscating writer in the 1820s. To be sure, Macaulay was a genius. As a poet, reviewer, essayist, historian, parliamentary orator, conversationalist, letter-writer and author of state papers, he was never less than a scintillating stylist and consummate rhetorician. He was also prodigiously learned, across a far wider spectrum of human knowledge than is possible for any professional historian or full time writer to be today. The result was that he fashioned and projected an inimitable authorial voice – by turns jaunty, authoritative, vigorous, ebullient, highly-coloured and warm-hearted – which can still catch and captivate the ear, and compel the reader to keep turning the pages. No 298 APPENDIX 299 one since Macaulay has ever written historical reviews quite like he did, and no historian could, or should, try to do so now. But when I was learning about history in the 1960s and 1970s, scholars such as J.H. Plumb, Lawrence Stone, A.J.P. Taylor and Hugh Trevor-Roper were at the peak of their powers and their productivity, and they were regularly reviewing in newspapers and periodicals on both sides of the Atlantic. They, too, were accomplished and confi dent stylists, with distinctive and opinionated voices, who reached a broad public audience, and as such they were Macaulay’s direct and legitimate descendants. I am not sure that the same can be said today, of the later generation of historians to which I myself belong, let alone of those younger scholars coming up fast behind us. Although there are now more professional historians in this country than ever before, there are some ways in which they impinge less on the public and cultural life of the nation than their forbears did a quarter of century ago, and one indication of this is the decline in serious historical reviewing, in the Saturday and Sunday papers. There are many explanations for this. One is that, as historical knowledge becomes more specialized, it becomes increasingly diffi cult to write confi dently across a range of subjects suffi ciently broad to establish a public identity as a regular and distinctive reviewer. Another is that the Research Assessment Exercise takes no note of such brief, ephemeral and un-footnoted activities, which means there is a strong disincentive for hard-pressed historians to undertake them. And as even the broadsheet newspapers ‘dumb down’ and tabloidize their pages, there is less space and scope for serious historical reviewing than once there was. Yet there remain many opportunities: in the ever-proliferating number of scholarly journals; in the ‘literary’ periodicals on both sides of the Atlantic; and (albeit diminishingly) in the ‘quality’ press. This inevitably means that historical reviews come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes, lengths and weights. Short notices, between fi ve and eight hundred words, are usually little more than a (very inadequate) précis of the book. Reviews of one thousand to fi fteen hundred words allow more scope for discussion and debate. And in a review-essay of two thousand words or more, there is opportunity to venture beyond the confi nes of the book, into a more general treatment of the subject it deals with, in the way that Macaulay pioneered and perfected. In short, different word limits do imply very different reviews, and from the outset, it is important to be clear which sort is being written. But this is not the only way in which historical 300 MAKING HISTORY NOW AND THEN reviews vary: for they are also aimed at readers who are themselves very diverse. Those produced for scholarly journals can take for granted an expert, professional audience; those appearing in the ‘literary’ periodicals can assume most of their readers are academics or intellectuals, but not necessarily experts; those written for the ‘quality’ press are intended for the ‘intelligent general reader’, which in our day usually (but not exclusively) means university graduates in any subject. Writing reviews for each of these different audiences requires rather different expositional strategies. But notwithstanding these variations of length and readership, there are two further aspects of historical reviewing which should remain constant, and be constantly borne in mind. Neither should need spelling out, but there are occasions when it is helpful and necessary to state the obvious, and this is surely one of them. The fi rst is that the prime purpose of any review should be to evaluate the book, the author and the subject. Even if the reviewer is more famous than the author, with a long-established reputation and a distinctive style, the historical work that is being discussed is the thing that matters. The review is parasitic on the book, and so is the reviewer, and this should always be remembered. The second is that, regardless of the precise number of words required, or the particular nature of the audience, there are several essential tasks that any serious reviewer must always conscientiously seek to discharge. Again, these should scarcely need spelling out, but perhaps it is appropriate to do so here. They are as follows: read the book; place the book; describe the book; judge the book. It is worth examining these four aspects of reviewing in more detail. It may seem absurd to insist that any book to be reviewed must fi rst be read by the reviewer. Surely, this is self-evident? No serious work of history can be completed in less than two years, and some take more than a decade: out of common decency, any author who has laboured thus hard and long is entitled to a full reading and a fair hearing. This, in turn, means that no conscientious reviewer should venture into print without having read the book in question at least once and preferably twice. Yet many reviews are often less thorough than they ought to be. Sometimes this arises from the unavoidable pressure of tight deadlines, as in the case of the fi rst volume of the Thatcher memoirs. The book was embargoed before publication, but most newspapers carried their notices within 48 hours, which means that none of them could have been based on a thorough reading. But all too often, such lapses occur for the simple reason that the reviewer has not bothered to read the book carefully, but has merely dipped into it or APPENDIX 301 idly skimmed it. Most experienced authors can easily identify such cursory and unprofessional reviews of their books, because the telltale signs are obvious: excessive concentration on the introduction, conclusion and a few particular chapters, and confusion or ignorance about the general argument. Only when the book has been read, pondered and understood, should the review of it be begun, and this must be done in such a way as to catch the reader’s attention. It can be with a memorable and arresting anecdote, picked up along the way; but when the word-count is limited, there is often insuffi cient space. It is usually better to open with an outline of the broader historical and contemporary issues with which the book engages, and with some remarks about who the author is, and how the subject is being approached. When publishing in the professional historical journals, some of this scene-setting can be dispensed with; but the closer towards the ‘general reader’ the review is directed, the more important and essential it becomes. For one of the prime purposes of such non-academic reviewing is to bring to the notice of the non-academic public those outstanding works of scholarly history about which they might not otherwise know, and the only way to do this is to begin by explaining why the subject, the book and the author matter. A classic instance of this is G.M. Trevelyan’s review of Lewis Namier’s England in the Age of the American Revolution, which he published in The Nation in 1930. Trevelyan wanted to draw attention to the novelty of Namier’s approach, and the importance of his fi ndings, in the hope that this might encourage a British university to give him a much-needed academic job. Soon after, Manchester did just that. Having read and placed the book, the next thing to do is to give some clear sense of what it is about.