Diary – 1 March 2003

I have written a novel about Middle England’s love affair with female newsreaders. I was struck by a survey which showed that viewers of these grave messengers of world events could remember only the first 30 seconds of what was said. The women newsreaders really are talking heads. My implicit thesis is that press journalists are superior to broadcasters: they are all form and no content; we are all content and no form. But the truth is that our invisibility is a matter of public courtesy. When the BBC began its highbrow fourth channel it recruited presenters from the press, who subsequently wrote of the channel with high regard. Viewing figures plunged. Within the BBC the channel was colloquially referred to as the ugly channel. Yet we still believe that lighting and make-up can achieve miracles.

And sometimes they can. I was photographed for the March edition of Vogue, to go with a book-related piece that I had written on …well, frankly, who cares? A team arrived at the Daily Telegraph with case after case of clothes and make-up. As an understated, bare-faced stylist quietly hung the clothes on the rail, Telegraph staff began to gather and then swarm and snatch. Shrieking, we staggered around in six-inch heels and wrapped ourselves in fine fabrics. The office started to look like Calcutta. The Vogue crew grew pale.

What the photographer wanted was a scene of throbbing news urgency. He asked to see the newsdesk, engine-room of the whole operation. A daily paper in the middle of the day is a bit like the English seaside out of season. At the end of the vast, empty expanse, a couple of subeditors sipped Cup-a-soups. I tried to explain that in an hour the room would be transformed by the returning army.