This Month

HEREWITH a few thoughts about the Book Page — its frail life cycle, as it begins and ends, in a good many newspapers.

The saga opens up when the Advertising Director tells the Managing Editor that the sheet is missing out on publishers’ advertising. There ought to be a Book Page, regular feature, reviews, jottings and notes, literary stuff. Worth giving the works — a whole page, maybe two. Might even get some circulation out of it. People read books, apparently. Why wouldn’t they read some book reviews? (Who knows what wild scheme the public might not go for?)

The proposal gets general endorsement. The paper has occasionally used “reviews” by staff members. It paid for them by giving the reviewer the book and a by-line. But the new scheme calls for a genuine “Literary Editor” and all the trimmings.

The paper hires a Literary Editor and throws him a huge party. Here goes for the big time! Watch us grow! Who said this wasn’t a hot literary town ?

The Literary Editor pitches in — everything dandy. The first Book Page has four columns of reviews and four columns of significant-looking book advertising. Next week: same thing. Fine business.

Third week: a breakfast food ad seems to have been mislaid, somehow, on the Book Page; issue offers three columns of reviews, two columns of publishers’ advertising, three columns of Poplets.

At this point, a friendly little luncheon conference is held by the Literary Editor, Managing Editor, and Advertising Director. Their decision is that there isn’t enough book advertising to sustain three columns of reviews. The Literary Editor is cut to a two-column quota. He solves this by canning his column “ Browsing About ” and sticking to individual reviews.

The next issue reiterates the Poplets ad — plus a fascinating list of used cars offered by Madman Jones, plus a sell-your-diamonds-for-cash invitation that one of the local display men has bagged.

At the end of six months: the Book Page carries four squib review’s, a half column in all. There are three wan little book advertisements aggregating thirty lines. The rest of the page is occupied by Florida resorts and a “reader” about the new through Pullmans to Miami, no more bothersome change at the Junction. The Literary Editor seems to be doing a lot of drinking.

Five years later: the Literary Editor has long since gone over the hill. The Book Page offers a short list (selected and typed by an office boy) under the heading “This Week’s New Books.” There is one ad, with coupon offer, for a new cookbook put out by a direct-mail outfit. The rest of the thoroughly unbookish page is filled by the “Monday only — 1¢ Sale” of a retail drug chain.

At this point the Advertising Director tells the Managing Editor that the sheet is missing out on publishers’ advertising. There ought to be a Book Page. . . .

The career cycle of a business executive proves, on scrutiny, to be similar.

Assume the executive, Doakes, is a beginner, a young man, inexperienced, bright, determined to make himself useful. Given various tasks, he works like a dog at them. Because most of them are childishly simple anyhow, he masters them quickly, is soon accomplishing immense quantities of effective work.

On this basis, more work is given the rising young hustler. And as the man who actually does the work, he knows more about it than anyone else around the place. “Ask Doakes — he has the whole story” or “Let’s give this one to Doakes — he’s good at this sort of stuff.”

Doakes begins to be overburdened. As new and more important responsibilities fall to him, he is obliged to farm out some of the lesser routines. He reaches a point where he can afford to do not hing unless it is terribly important. To get there, he has farmed out every last one of his routine assignments. He is too big a man, his company tells him, to waste time on what can just as well be done by underlings.

Doakes no longer knows the meaningful details of the jobs he has delegated to others. He deals only with important matters.

But the terribly important things persist, mysteriously, in presenting problems of detail. Budgets, quotas, estimates, adjustments that Doakes could formerly rattle off to the last dime become perplexing to him. He enters a phase of asking questions, trying to keep up with what is going on.

The uninformed questions that Doakes seems to be raising so frequently cause some misgivings among his colleagues. Is he really so ignorant as all that? Doesn’t he know the Altoona territory was redistricted three years ago and that Klempenfurth is now in Topeka? That the override arrangement with Simpkins applied only to the Amerozco business and not to the rest of Pettengill’s accounts? (Pettengill is fit to be tied, boiling.)

Doakes’s efforts are worse than ignorant: they are a nuisance, they get in the way. Doakes comes to be regarded as a veritable bottleneck. The people who have to get things done start by-passing Doakes.

Finally — and there simply aren’t, enough board chairmanships to take care of the Doakeses - the executive committee asks itself a question: “What on earth does Doakes do around this place anyhow?”

Meanwhile the two executives just below Doakes in rank are feverishly divesting themselves of routine tasks in order to be available for work that is terribly important. One of them will inherit the mantle of Doakes.

And far down the list, a bright young hustler is working his head off on all manner of new and delightful assignments. Doing very well, they say.