Among the presents for my eightieth was a most exciting surprise from number one daughter: Mirror On 1941. This is a collection of photocopies of news items from the year of my birth from what was on its way to being, if it was not already, the biggest-selling daily newspaper in the English-speaking world. There is only one page per issue, and only 120 issues are excerpted, but the yearbook certainly gives a flavour of those times.
The progress of the war is reported, but also the occasional failure, something which distinguished the British media from those under Axis control. The coverage did tend to be jingoistic, though, and the socialists who staffed the Mirror were not afraid of epithets which today would not be regarded as PC: "Record run by wops" headlines a report of a retreat by Italian forces. "Hun troops move into Spain" and "Japs warn whites to quit the Pacific" are typical headlines from February.
There are stories from the home front apart from the war, but one suspects that the balance between foreign and domestic news was rather more even in the actual newspapers. The most obvious omission, presumably for copyright reasons, is that of the cartoon strips for which the Mirror was well-known. The most famous, "Jane", is at least available by other means.
Be warned, when inspiration fails, the author will dip into the Mirror collection for a news item relevant to the day.
No comments:
Post a Comment