How do you read your Sunday Times? Do you enjoy a prologue with
your lovely local newsagent? ’Um, there’s three Moneys and no Sport in
mine.’ ’I’m sorry sir. It’s difficult, I’m telling you.’ You possibly
don’t begin with a frantic search for the Leeds United match report, or
a skim of Business to see if there are any stories Campaign should know
about. You might turn to the front page - apart from our very own Andrew
Grice - more in hope than expectation, because you will have already
listened to the radio, or watched Breakfast with Frost after
Teletubbies. You will glance at the Sunday night movies, check out the
Travel destinations, and bin the Appointments, Money (too scary to
read), Getting Wired (ditto), Books (no point, no time) and Business
(Sunday’s too precious) bits, then give the inserts to the babies to
mangle.
Next, like many people you know, you will do a bizarre thing. In
succession, you will read the effervescent Tara Palmer-Tomkinson, whose
column is the most meaningless of anyone’s, anywhere; turn to the
appalling Michael Winner, whose views on restaurants and food you don’t
respect; look for AA Gill (on restaurants and TV, but nothing else),
whose beautiful prose style is in marked contrast to his personality;
and the extraordinary Taki, who runs T P-T close for meaninglessness and
whose views make AA Gill appear liberal. Then there are all those who
you can get away with not reading: Simon Sebag Montefiore, AA Gill in
News Review, any contributor to the motoring section (a personal
prejudice).
You’re not alone. Virtually anyone you know a) reads the Sunday Times,
b) professes not to like it, c) devours the likes of T P-T and kicks
themselves for it. Of course, there are journalists you look forward to
reading (Lesley White, Hugh McIlvanney), but, for me, the overall level
of antipathy is strange considering that it’s the only publication I
hate to miss.
That’s its secret. You can take the others, but the Sunday Times really
is the Sunday papers for so many different sectors, particularly
business.
It understands and exploits the contemporary taste for the shallow. It
also proves the power of polemical opinion. We read Taki for the joy of
being wound up.
It’s an extraordinary privilege to be a ’must’ - whatever the degree of
seriousness or size of category: from the Financial Times to Hello!,
Caterer and Hotelkeeper to the News of the World, Sky Sport to the
Lancet.
Their own consumers may profess to dislike them, but they’re buggers to
compete against. It’s easy to see how this happens in the trade press
niche, but for a Sunday national it’s a remarkable achievement. We all
aspire to ’must’ status, but it’s bloody hard work getting there. And
even harder staying there.
