Romps, Tots and Boffins

by Robert Hutton

  * Philip Howard’s monograph on journalese from 2000, The Press Gang, offers a fuller history, suggesting the word was invented shortly before 1882.

  * Perhaps this is the moment to talk about ‘lawmakers’. No single thing that I write creates as much comment as my references to Members of Parliament as ‘lawmakers’. Colleagues on British papers read out my copy in a mock American drawl. And, I concede, it is not a word I would ever use in conversation. But who outside Britain knows what an MP is? If I use MP, should my Irish colleagues use TD? Should stories from Russia refer to ‘deputies’? I will buy beer for anyone who can come up with a more acceptable word.

  * One largely unnoticed effect of the internet has been the redundancy of copy-takers, the typing pools at the end of a phone that used to be in every newspaper office. Today, everyone has an internet-connected laptop, and stories can be written and sent in by email on smartphones. Even 15 years ago, the standard way to file when out of the office was over the phone. When I was doing festival reviews for the Edinburgh Evening News in 1996, I don’t think they even had an email address. Filing over the phone, often while driving down the motorway or from a payphone in the rain, was good for copy: it added urgency, forced you to get the story straight in your head before you started, and there’s nothing like being asked ‘is there much more of this?’ to tighten your writing.

  GENERAL

  acolytes • supporters of someone with whom we disagree.

  afoot • what trouble is and plans are.

  after • we will now imply a link between two events that may or may not be related. Or try ‘ahead of’, ‘comes as’ or ‘in the wake of’.

  agonising • what waits are, suggesting that whatever ‘tenterhooks’ may be, they’re not very comfortable.

  amid • may be appropriate if after or ‘in the wake of’ aren’t.

  anxiously • how families will endure agonising waits.

  arcane rules • ones we can’t be bothered to explain.

  Arctic conditions • snow.

  avenues • ‘And the avenues?’ ‘Exhausted, sir.’ ‘Which of them?’ ‘Every avenue, sir.’

  balding pate • generally only used in diary columns and Sunday newspaper profiles.

  ban • newspapers are champions of free speech, but we accept that it has limits. Those limits are, broadly, the internet, popsongs, films and BBC broadcasts relating to sex or drugs. Reporters should keep in mind when writing stories under the headline ‘Ban This Sick Stunt’ that in 10 years they will be unable to explain what all the fuss was about.

  baron • oil or union. Never press, unless writing about events 60 or more years ago.

  battle-scarred • what a veteran is. As with veteran, rarely used of someone with actual scars from actual battles.

  bean counter • the kind of person who says an organisation can’t afford to do something we think it should do. Within a newspaper, the kind of person who says journalists can’t go on assignments to interesting and sunny places.

  behind closed doors • where top-level crisis talks typically take place.

  bid • it’s so short: two and a half letter spaces! And it can mean so many things! Which may be why it gets used so much. For instance, ‘murder bid’, which as the journalist Gordon Darroch observed, evokes someone asking, ‘Who will start me at £100 for this fine mid-Regency homicide?’

  bigwig • a chief we don’t like.

  black hole • a point in space so dense that it creates a gravitational field so strong not even light can escape. Or, in newspapers, a gap. Especially in finance, where it typically refers to any funding shortfall over £1 million.

  blanket • what snow does to the countryside.

  boffin • anyone with a job at a university, a science GCSE, or a lab coat.

  bolthole • where celebrities and politicians ‘hide out’ from, well, us.

  bombshell • now we bring you news of a surprising thing that’s happened.

  branded • a more painful kind of dubbing.

  branded, immediately • what someone’s actions were, by us.

  breakneck speed • definitely over 40 mph.

  brink • a good way to write about something that would be a really terrific story if it did happen is to write that it’s on the brink of happening.

  buccaneer • the business equivalent of an ‘auteur director’. The ideal person to helm a company, presumably.

  budding • someone under 20 who’s good at something.

  By Our Foreign Staff • a little newspaper joke. Of course we don’t have a foreign staff any more. We can barely cover Kent. We lifted this from the newswires.

  calculated snub • the worst kind of snub.

  chequered past • they’ve never been convicted of anything, but keep in mind while reading this that they’re still pretty dodgy.

  chiefs • we don’t really understand business, as a look over our books will confirm. This is how we refer to the mysterious figures who apparently are quite important in it. Typically, a couple of dozen business chiefs will have written a letter either urging or warning of something. Or ‘road chiefs’, who are especially popular in local papers. But not Road Chefs, a class of restaurant in which no journalist would be seen dead.

  clamour • we’ve written two editorials about this. If there’s one in today, refer to a ‘growing clamour’.

  clarion call • someone has said something with which we agree.

  coffers • where organisations of which we disapprove keep their money.

  confusion surrounds • we can’t work out what’s going on, but you’re welcome to try.

  considering • the all-purpose unfalsifiable policy story. No one will ever be able to convincingly deny that they’ve considered something. If the thing they’re considering might actually happen, try ‘actively considering’, to distinguish it from the sort of passive consideration people give things before rejecting them out of hand.

  corruption • the appalling practice of politicians taking decisions that may benefit companies that have given their party money in the past. Completely different from ‘freebies’, when companies give journalists gifts, meals, or holidays worth hundreds or thousands of pounds simply out of kindness, and with no thought of receiving anything in return.

  cosy consensus • an agreement with which we disagree. Not to be confused with a ‘sensible compromise’.

  crack • what ‘special forces’ and ‘marksmen’ are. Also worth mentioning lower down in the piece that these are ‘elite troops’.

  crimper • hairdresser. As in ‘celebrity crimper Nicky Clarke’. Typically concerned with stars’ ‘tresses’.

  crisis talks • what countries hold as their banks teeter on the brink of collapse, and what football clubs have with wantaway hitmen.

  critics say • we think.

  crunch talks • we’re pretty sure everyone’s run out of patience with the crisis talks. We certainly have.

  dash off • 1. false modesty about own carefully crafted prose; 2. a sneer at a rival’s carefully crafted prose. Or try ‘churn out’.

  deepened • what happened to people’s difficulties last night.

  densely argued • good grief, what on earth is this guy talking about?

  designer clothes • as opposed to a sack with holes torn in it.

  devastating • what ‘blows’ are, and what we hope allegations may turn out to be.

  disinterested • ten quid says we actually mean ‘uninterested’.

  dogged • 1. The kind of defiance shown by sportsmen who spent the match being beaten; 2. What scandal has done to a politician, due to our insistence on going on about it.

  doubts remain • we don’t have the first idea what’s really going on, and we’ve found a smart-sounding way to say it.

  draconian • the government is proposing something with which we disagree.

  dragging his feet • what the person shelving something (in the long grass) is doing.

  dubbed • s
omeone’s been given a nickname. By us.

  electrify • what we hope today’s intervention will do to the debate, in the sense of making hair stand on end and causing involuntary twitching, but ideally without electrocuting the argument, in the sense of killing it.

  eleventh hour • the time at which one should start expecting last-ditch negotiations or last-gasp interventions.

  embroiled • the means by which people find themselves, unwillingly, dragged into disputes.

  emerged • how people left rooms if negotiations were successful. If they ‘broke down’, then participants typically ‘stormed out’.

  epicentre • for when ‘very centre’ just doesn’t sound exciting enough. Even though it doesn’t mean ‘very centre’.*

  expected to • the person in question’s office briefed us yesterday.

  expenses-paid • for some reason, when they hear the word ‘expenses’, journalists assume fraud must be involved. Psychologists might be able to explain why this should be.

  facing charges • they haven’t been charged with a crime, they may never be charged with a crime, but they could be charged with a crime.

  fancy • what lawyers and accountants are. Wearing silk shirts, probably.

  fat cats • highly paid people of whom we disapprove. But never used of some of those whose pay is highest – rock stars, footballers, actors. Picture instead a man with a top hat and a curly moustache.

  foretaste • always a chilling one.

  foul-mouthed tirade • someone has said a Bad Word. This event is always ‘extraordinary’ or ‘astonishing’ to newspapers, whose staff are well known for their delicate sensibilities.

  fresh (of fears, doubts, hopes and tensions) • old, but reheated with a new quote.

  full crisis mode • a story has got so bad that the subject has hired public relations experts or, if they already had them, called them in for a meeting.

  funnelling money • giving it to someone of whom we disapprove.

  funnyman (female: funnygirl) • usually TV funnyman, for why else would we write about him? Consider whether he may be ‘rubber-faced’. Generally associated with ‘vice shame’, ‘heartbreak split’, or ‘secret tears’. NB: needn’t actually be funny.

  funster • we cannot make it any clearer to you that this person is absolutely no fun to be around whatsoever.

  fury • most effective when referring to something basically pretty trivial, as in ‘BIEBER FURY’, used by both the BBC and Sky in a story about a pop concert starting late.

  gauntlet • 1. ‘thrown down’. A back-me-or-sack-me challenge has been issued; 2. ‘run’. They had to get past our reporter and photographer to reach their car.

  glug • how champagne is consumed by fat cats. Also ‘guzzle’.

  going forward • the reporter, possibly half asleep, has copied out too much of the press release.

  green light • what ‘road chiefs’ have given to plans for a new roundabout.

  grizzled • what veterans are.

  growing (of fears, doubts, hopes and tensions) • unchanged.

  guru • management writer Peter Drucker summed this one up: We are using the word “guru” only because “charlatan” is too long to fit into a headline.’

  hailed • ‘... and last night tourism chiefs “hailed” the knock-on effect.’ As in, ‘All hail, mighty and worthy knock-on effect, we salute thee.’

  heady • what mixes are.

  heartfelt • 1. what pleas are; 2. regular in Daily Mail standfirsts: ‘all parents must read this heartfelt and searingly personal account...’

  heartlands • a place that used to be famous for doing something, and is now famous for not doing it any more, e.g. ‘Tory shire heartlands’; ‘Labour inner-city heartlands’ and Chicago, which according to The Guardian used to be one of the Rolling Stones’ heartlands.

  heavily armed • what SWAT teams, terrorists and soldiers are, to the constant surprise of reporters, if not readers.

  helm (verb) • the manner in which chiefs run their businesses.

  hero • anyone who has ever worn a uniform.* Except traffic wardens.

  high-stakes gamble • a decision about which we have our doubts.

  hit back • disagreed with something. See hit out.

  hit out • said something. Usually a prelude to someone else hitting back.

  hopeful (noun) • one who is about to be disappointed, as in ‘leadership hopeful’, ‘Oscar hopeful’ and ‘Wimbledon hopeful’.

  horror death smash • a fatal car accident.

  the humble X • all non-human species, on first reference.

  ill-fated • frankly, it was inevitable that anything which ‘started as an innocent day out’ would turn out to have ‘ended in tragedy’.

  indictment • usually ‘damning’, sometimes ‘scathing’, and occasionally ‘searing’.

  infrastructure • either creaks or crumbles.

  inks deal • how a company or sportsman signs a contract.

  it is not suggested • we can’t prove any of the things we’ve spent the last 600 words suggesting, but the lawyer reckons if we put this line in, they won’t sue.

  jostle • how people get a position.

  journalism’s Oscars • used of any award a paper has won. Actors rarely describe the Oscars as ‘Hollywood’s British Press Awards’.

  just minutes away • the distance between two places. The minutes in question can be up to 60, and the mode of transport a fast car on an empty road.

  languishing • a particularly unpleasant form of queuing.

  last ditch • the only ditch worth mentioning in this saga.

  last gasp • even more last-minute than the last ditch.

  last night • use to add urgency to a story written yesterday lunchtime, or, on a Sunday paper, on Wednesday.

  let rip • a rant, but with the added sense of someone finally expressing thoughts they’ve been suppressing for weeks, months, or years. Often written with a sense of sympathy from journalists who know just how this feels.

  lethal cocktail • there were two drugs in their system, you say?

  lifeblood • what small firms are to the economy. Due to a modern medical miracle, they’re often also its ‘backbone’.*

  line their pockets • what fat cats do with the bumper pay packets they trouser.

  little Jack • this enables readers to distinguish between this six-year-old and other, larger six-year-olds who have jobs and mortgages.

  locked-in • what crunch talks generally are.

  lofty • what ambitions are.

  long grass • where plans that have been ‘shelved’ are kicked, after much ‘foot-dragging’.

  loom • what disaster does, shortly before it strikes.

  loved one • the good news is that if we’ve referred to you this way, you’re unlikely to be in a condition to care about it.

  magnate • someone who has made a lot of money doing something. Reporters are urged to take every opportunity to use this for someone who made their fortune selling refrigeration equipment.

  Marmite • what the person one either loved or hated resembled.

  mired in confusion • what the plans are, probably because of that U-turn after the ‘wheels came off’.

  moggy • all cats, on second reference.

  much-trumpeted • our rivals got very excited about this. We’re about to enjoy making them look foolish.

  mull • they’re thinking about it. Well, they might do it.

  muzzle • any attempt, usually by government or the courts, to suppress the free expression of journalists. It’s quite wrong for such bodies to stop people writing what they think. That’s the news editor’s job.

  mystery surrounds • in time, it may deepen. Right now, we don’t have a clue what’s going on.

  near miss • really, a near hit.

  nipper • bit bigger than a tot, not yet a teen.

  officialdom • use this wherever hippies say ‘The Man’.


  on the line • where one puts money and reputation.

  one either loved or hated ... • the editor and I disagree, and I have been allowed to salvage this much of my dignity.

  opine • what the idiots who write for our rivals do.

  overshadowed • what the story we wanted to write did to the story that the people we were writing about wanted us to write.*

  pal • friend 1. where space is short and we fear going over a line; 2. this is a lively, fun publication, and we’re going to use the language of young people. From 1950.*

  pay packet • what people trouser, if it’s bumper. Or, if they’re leaving a job, try ‘pay-off’.

  pen (verb) • how humble scribes give their words solid form.

  penpusher • usually found in a back office. Not to be confused with a scribe, or anyone else who pens things.

  perfect storm • two bad things have happened to someone at the same time.

  Pictures! • newspaper billboards often promise pictures. Sometimes, those pictures will even be of the story in question, rather than a plane like the one that crashed, or the restaurant where yesterday’s shooting occurred, as it looked when it opened five years ago.

  pins • legs. This story will work best if read in the voice of Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins.

  playboy • usually a prince, arms dealer or son.

  plea • a request.

  plucky • not long for this world.

  plunge • what stock markets do. Or, occasionally people, in which case it’s a ‘death plunge’.

  pooch • a dog, of any size and breed, that has lived up to the best traditions of its species by faithfully and humbly leading children out of danger or helping a pensioner cross the road. Not a synonym for devil dog.

  possibly • then again, possibly not.

  postcode lottery • used to describe the uneven distribution of resources, a bad thing. The message may have been missed though, as someone set one up a couple of years ago, presumably thinking it sounded quite attractive.

  potentially fatal • well, potentially. I mean, a peanut is potentially fatal, right?

  powerhouse • a business that is doing well.

  provocative • Twitter is going to go NUTS about this piece. See controversial.