pumpkinstrokemarrow

So I thought I had better have a crack at module 1 of NVQ (level 5) (media studies) to take my mind of it. Take 1 free Evening Standard from 15 October and do a bit of content analysis. Not actually read the thing you understand, just do a bit of counting up. So I find that of the 64 pages 32 are completely clear of advertising, if you overlook the 5 pages of listings - sport, TV and city prices. Very odd that these two key numbers are both powers of two? Is the thing produced by taking a very large sheet of paper and folding it 6 times? Does the editor have a numerology thing going, like so many giants of the 17th and 18th centuries? 10 pages were entirely adverts and the remaining 22 pages were mixed. Overall, quite cleverly distributed so as to give a nice variegated and sparkly feel to the thing. One did not feel overwhelmed by the adverts. Something the Sun has always been very good at, in contrast to the Mirror which, to me anyway, always has a very dull feel to it. Never mind what it might or might not actually be saying; I very rarely get that far. It would be interesting to get a peek at the Evening Standard numbers. How much does the thing cost to produce, how much do they charge for adverts? Does the price for adverts vary with shape, position in paper, position in week or circulation on the day? Presumably an interesting judgement call here: a paper which is entirely adverts would not have a very good circulation. I feel one of those graphs one used to do in economics coming on. Strong on concept and shape, weak on actual numbers.

And while we are on the subject of adverts, intrigued by the fact that the Yorkshire Tourist Board sees fit to be the prime sponsor for peak time ITV3. Which must account for 97% of my TV watching, being a steady diet of murder mystery retreads. Just the thing in the early evening.

Moving on, it seems that one Fiona Mantelpeice has won the Booker Prize for a peice of historical fiction. Also that there is quite a lot of heavily researched historical fiction about these days. So heavily researched that the resultant fiction can get a bit heavy. A lot of fact cluttering up the love interest. So I spent the second half of last week pondering on the evils of historical fiction, of books where you can never be sure whether the interesting fact you had come across was indeed, fact or fiction. Could you safely peddle it as fact in the pub? Now I like my peddlings to be reasonably true. I don't like to peddle something which sounds factlike but which in fact is not. Leaving aside a bit of occasional banter. So if I want to learn about Henry VIII, I turn up a history book, not a story book.

I then thought that perhaps the answer was to mark the text of the story book in some way. So the pillars of fact around which one arranges the romance to be printed in distinguishing red. Or perhaps twigs of fact. Which, for some reason, reminds me of an uncle who invited you to make a few scribbles on a blank sheet of paper which he would then proceed to incorporate into a picture.

And then I remembered that lots of books which I do regard as respectable incorporate fact. So War and Peace includes lots of facts. Facts which includes people, such as Napoleon and facts in the form of period colour, most of which I have always assumed to be reasonably accurate. Nevertheless, the main interest is not in those facts. And then there is a much more recent book called 'The Battle' by someone called Rimbaud, a fictional reconstruction of the battle of Aspern, an unpleasant slogging match of a battle. Now Rimbaud probably did lots of research, read lots of memoires and his pillars of fact are in consequence quite thick on the ground. Here much more of the interest is in the facts of the matter. Love interest quite slender.

All of which leaves me thinking that my initial disdain for the Mantelpeice effort was quite misplaced. A disdain fuelled by something quite other than the literary merits of the case. Something to try and fathom on the way to the baker.

One answer would be that if the Mantelpeice effort sells, why bother enquiring further? Selling well is sufficient unto itself. Honour is its own reward and all that. But I like to think one can do better.