bout de papier, Vol. 5, No. 1 (1987) — Spring 1987 // Printemps 1987, pp. 20–21
Sidney Freifield’s alert commentary on The Canadian Style: A Guide to Writing and Publishing prompts me to write about another side of the literary coin, by which I mean rewriting drafts for the Prime Minister and Secretary of State for External Affairs.
I should explain perhaps that I knew well all of the departmental masters he cites Hume Wrong, John Holmes, Escott Reid, Charles Ritchie, Gerry Riddell, Herbert Moran (I had more to do with Archie Day in his Massey Commission days than through any departmental contacts).
As many readers well know, my East Block service began in the Prime Minister’s Office, and until May 9, 1940 my writing duties ranged over a wide field of public concerns: speeches on commemorative occasions, messages of sympathy, replies to correspondence which fell outside a “routine” pattern, “short notes” (emerging on half sheets) for public appearances (Liberal party functions by title were tacitly, and in my view properly, excluded).
20 bout de papier Vol.
There was in summer 1938 a formidable row of black binders containing prototype messages for almost any contingency, fire, flood and pestilence included. Once I took my literary courage into my own hands — the process began with letters of sympathy — I was chastened to find that my drafts in turn became the models. The ultimate commendation, when it came, was “There, you see, it’s these little things that make all the difference!” Drafting a letter for someone’s eightieth birthday had never seemed a little thing to me, but even occasional commendation was encouraging.
Writing skills were put to other tests before and during the Royal Visit, 1939. The most formal statements and speeches were well beyond my ken, but many arrangements of “detail” made up a nearly full-time preoccupation for several months. The personal detail for Mr. Mackenzie King did not require style as style, except that it had to be compact and with a minimum of “loose ends.” The whole document (typed on 4’ × 5½” looseleaf sheets) stood up remarkably well.
The Information for the Guidance of the Press, which emerged in what we called a Five Star Final, was an entirely different matter. The section on the constitutional significance of the first visit by a reigning sovereign was written (and re-written) by the Prime Minister himself, and he added a considerable section on the position of Minister in Attendance, which he was throughout the visit to Canada (not then including Newfoundland) and to the United States. I am not sure how much guidance the working press took (or wanted to receive) from this exercise in high-level journalism; it added considerably to my own working experience in dealing with the Government Printing Bureau in the long-vanished brick building at the west end of St. Patrick Street.
When I moved to Laurier House in May, 1940, the mechanism was altered to the extent that I was expected to provide at least a draft for nearly every public statement that emerged until after the end of hostilities. A draft was to be interpreted as a beginning only; some public addresses went through six or seven revisions. The record low score — two only — arose from an address to the American Federation of Labour meeting in Toronto in 1942. Following the Quebec Conference in 1943, when President Roosevelt was to visit Ottawa for a ceremony on Parliament Hill, the Prime Minister was to welcome him, live on radio, in a three-minute allocation. Mr. King dictated a “bring in” memorandum which filled three and a half pages of single-space typing. My East Block colleague, looking over this digest, remarked (only half sardonically) «this seems to include everything except The Secret of Heroism.
The Prime Ministerial style and mood only rarely provided much room for originality. When Mr. King was preparing to speak in Kingston on the 50th anniversary of the death of Sir John A. Macdonald, I began a draft by recalling the tribute by Sir Wilfrid Laurier in the House of Commons, in which he referred to the late Prime Minister as “endowed with those inner, subtle, indefinable graces of soul which win and keep the hearts of men.”
“How did you know to include this?” (he asked)
“I remember reading it in public school” (I said, truthfully)
“May I see it in print?”
So I produced the prize book (Builders of the Canadian Commonwealth by George H. Locke, Toronto 1923) presented by the Canadian Club of Victoria, B.C.
The incident evidently made an impression: he put the quotation into his remarks.
There were other approaches to the goal. In January, 1947, Mr. King was to speak (live on national radio) at a ceremony at the Supreme Court of Canada at which the first certificates of Canadian citizenship under the then-new Act were to be presented.
My draft began: “I speak to you tonight as a citizen of Canada.” (period, paragraph.)
“You can’t have a paragraph of only one sentence!” (said a slightly pained voice).
“Why not?” (I said; and because something more evidently was required), if you say this, and pause at the end of the sentence, there will be applause.”
So the speech began with the single sentence, and he paused, though not quite long enough, because the applause overran his next sentence. But the general effect was salutary.
Even discretion had its limits in drafting. There arrived at Laurier House an unsealed envelope from the Central Chancery of the Orders of Chivalry in London. The standing rule was that unsealed letters should be opened, and that if a draft reply could be attached to the incoming communication, this also should be done. The Registrar informed Mr. King that in the roll of Companions of the Most Distinguished Order of St. Michael and St. George Mr. King’s seniority would now entitle him to a stall in the Chapel of the Order, and to have his armorial bearings affixed over the top of the stall.
I knew that the Prime Minister, in advance of the Royal Visit in 1939 had “solicited and received His Majesty’s permission to discontinue the use of the Letters C.M.G. after his name.” The decoration had been conferred in 1907; I was not party to the discontinuing procedure, though I had formed the impression that the CMG, short-run, had acquired a certain nuisance value and that the King probably said, very well if he wishes it that way.
In what I hoped was now a convenient style, I drafted “it will doubtless be within your knowledge that a number of years ago I solicited and received (etc. as above) … in these circumstances it would evidently be inappropriate to act upon the rest of your letter.
I was Duty Officer when the reply came forward for signature.
“Who wrote this letter?” said an official voice.
“I did” (stoutly, as I thought)
“Well, it’s a good letter, but it doesn’t go far enough. Take this!”
There then followed a slightly laboured (as I thought) explanation, part honesty, part vindication. It had not even followed the crystalline tactic (in a Canadian tradition best represented by Lord Durham at Quebec in 1838) whereby the principal dictates a letter to be signed by his Private Secretary; on other occasions Mr. King relied on this mechanism, and in this case I rather thought he had missed a good opportunity.
English through the Wringer (with a nod at the title on this reminiscence) had one Grand Annual outing, which arose in the drafting of the Speech from the Throne. The Wringer ought perhaps to have had only a minor role: the legislative program had been threshed over and basically agreed, but to clothe it in language of any freshness and vigour was a challenge which the drafters, myself included, achieved only on rare occasions. The best summary towards the end of the day was my colleague’s remark that there are only a limited number of ways of invoking the blessings of Divine Providence.
Wringer or no, one learned on the job. We learned to try to avoid excessive sibilance in any spoken passage. A wheat farmer in Alberta, who was a regular (and valued) correspondent, once wrote to ask Mr. King why he persisted in doing violence to the English language, as “Perzia instead of Pers-sia, Azia instead of As-sia.” There was a moderately hilarious sequel: “Dear Mr. X: If you can suggest a dentist who can deal with my front teeth there will be no further problem. Your sincerely.”
There were some customary usages that might now be considered archaic; aught, meaning anything, and naught, meaning nothing) both of which the Concise Oxford Dictionary, which we customarily used, calls archaic). And there was a wonderfully-graded ascending scale of saying Thank You: I thank you, I thank you warmly, I thank you most warmly, I cannot thank you too warmly.
In drafting related specifically to External Affairs, in which even as External Affairs Liaison Officer I had a limited part, I had a continuing responsibility, especially from 1943 until VE Day, for Prime Ministerial Statements on the progress of hostilities. The materials to be incorporated came primarily through service channels; every draft had to be cleared for security, but in the end it was possible for Mr. King to give a statement as it had been drafted (one example was the review which preceded his statement on functional representation on July 9, 1943).
One other responsibility, which I took on Mr. King’s behalf, was writing to prisoners of war in reply to the entitled post-cards they occasionally addressed to the Prime Minister. I used the address of 335 Laurier Avenue East, and signed my own name, saying what I thought might be appropriate. When I met some of these men overseas (as at Dieppe in August, 1946) I reflected how important everyday language could, and perhaps should, be.
View the original scanned pages →
Originally published in bout de papier, Vol. 5, No. 1 (1987) — Spring 1987 // Printemps 1987, pp. 20–21. Read the rest of this issue →
