SIR ROGER "Rabbit" Elliott, self-appointed supremo of Oxford University Press and still in search of a peerage, was aghast to have drawn to his attention at the end of last year a prominent advertisement in the Oxford Times [advert follows].
It was placed by respected English language textbook author R. W. Noble, and requested information from Oxford readers "who know first-hand the facts behind the landmark case of Andrew Malcolm versus OUP". Malcolm, Eye readers will recall, was the author whose contract to publish a philosophy book the Press refused to honour, and who as a result took the august imprint to court and was recently awarded £35,000 in damages.
[the following paragraph was the subject of a libel action brought by Sir Roger Elliott against Private Eye and its editor Ian Hislop in March 1993 - settled out of court, with confidentiality.]
Noble's advertisement asked specifically: "Can anyone show me the missing papers from the late July 1985 delegates meeting?" This was a particularly strange request as, in the witness box, Sir "Dodger" Rabbit swore that OUP's supervisory board of delegates kept no record of general books (as opposed to academic books) which were due to be discussed at the delegates meeting on 23 July 1985. And Sir Roger could not possibly have intended to perjure himself.
Thus it must now be embarrassing that a copy of the list, dated 19 July 1985 and circulated "to all delegates", has come to light. Five books were presented by the Press's then general books' editor, Will Sulkin (now running Random House's Pimlico imprint, but whose memory of these events is curiously forgetful). They were Ann Pasternak Slater's critical biography of Evelyn Waugh; a collection of essays on another Eliot, T.S., edited by James Olney; The Annotated Innocence of Father Brown; Andrew Malcolm's famous work, Making Names; and The New Oxford Book of Modern Verse edited by James Fenton.
The minutes of the meeting of the delegates of the Press record that, under the item "General Publications", "The proposal for The New Oxford Book of Modern Verse was deferred for further consideration... The other titles tabled were approved." The other titles, of course, included Andrew Malcolm's book.
Reaching into OUP's annual profits of £17 million, Sir Rabbit is paying £275 per hour to solicitor Michael "Mickey Mouse" Smyth, of Clifford Chancer, in an ongoing effort to bolster his increasingly hazardous reputation. The lawyers have already pocketed more than £400,000 from the charitable publishers during their seven-year war with the dogged Malcolm.
But why should the American, London-based author and New York Times writer Noble be so interested in the Malcolm affair? Surely not because he was contracted by OUP, at the height of the oil boom, to write a series of English language text books aimed at the Middle East market but, when the oil bubble burst, the Press bailed out of its contract, having published only a single title?
Noble demanded full compensation for loss of potential earnings, and was of course refused. Eventually, tired of months of legal wrangling, he turned up unexpectedly at OUP's Walton Street offices, asking to see Sir Rabbit. He was told he was not in the country. Noble pitched camp, declining to leave until Elliott saw him. A female editor with whom Noble had worked greeted him in friendly fashion, and was dragged away, screaming, by security guards. Noble continued to refuse to be manhandled from the premises, and was eventua!ly put in an office from which the telephones were removed.
Some hours later, Sir Rabbit materialised, and to his quivering horror Noble served him and his branch director, R. (another Roger) C. Boning, with a writ. The arbitration hearing between R. W. Noble and The Chancellor, Masters and Scholars of the University of Oxford is slated to be heard shortly.
Meanwhile, no doubt expecting further mad authors to put in their oars, Sir Roger has appointed a full-time lawyer to the staff, Miss Justine Winternitz (sic).
'Bookworm'
OUP I am an OUP author. I wish to get in touch with the OUP staff members who, during my sojourn in your foyer on 9 July 1992, offered to help in respect of my 3 book contracts.
Regarding also my main precedent "Malcolm Versus OUP" - Can anyone provide missing documentation such as lists of General Books titles at the Delegates' Meeting in July 1985?
Please write to: R. W. Noble... (address)
Confidentiality will be preserved as you request.
AS READERS of the last Eye will recall, OUP declined to publish Andrew Malcolm's witty philosophical treatise, Making Names. When the manuscript emerged last August from its lengthy sub judice twilight, it was published by the previously unknown Brighton imprint of AKME at the eccentric price of £24.90.
Given the national press coverage of little Malcolm's fight against the Oxford eunuchs, it might have been assumed that the book, intended for the general reader, would be reviewed widely, if only to see whether it was any good. Not one newspaper touched it; in spite of the fact that philosophical gurus such as Alan Ryan and Galen Strawson are quoted on the back of the jacket recommending it.
The Times Educational Supplement approached various "name" philosophers to review the controversial tome, but so all-embracing and insidious are the academic world and OUP that, by bewildering coincidence, every one declined. It was eventually (25 September, 1992) enthusiastically reviewed by linguistics expert R. W. Noble, himself in dispute with OUP, to the rage of OUP's chief executive, Sir Roger "Rabbit" Elliott.
'Bookworm'
In the same issue of the Eye, 29th January 1993, AKME placed an advertisement for Making Names quoting the following puffs:
"An exceptional piece of work, highly unusual in both content and presentation. More dramatic than Plato or Berkeley, wonderfully easy to read." Prof. Roy Edgley, Sussex University"Entertaining dialogues... realistic direct arguments... comparable to some of Russell's later writing... Making Names is an original tour de force." R. W. Noble, Times Ed. Sup.
"I was quite gripped. I feel personally committed to it." Henry Hardy, ex-editor, OUP
"A load of rubbish." Richard Charkin, ex-director, OUP
This provoked a William Boot "Unauthorised Returns" piece in The Bookseller, 19th February 1993:
What is known in the trade as a right old ding-dong has been going on between Andrew Malcolm, author of Making Names: An Idea of Philosophy, and the nobs at OUP, with the result that he seems to have ended up publishing it himself. Having no wish to incur the wrath of Sir Roger Elliott, let alone all those delegates, I have nothing to say on the rights and wrongs of the matter, and it's all been in Private Eye anyway.However, there was an interesting ad for the book in last week's Eye, alongside "Dial-a-Slag" and "The ultimate thrill... Doris Drops 'Em". Henry Hardy, described as "ex-Editor, OUP", is quoted thus: "I was quite gripped. I feel personally committed to it." Then, joy of joys, we find Richard Charkin, "ex-Director, OUP": "A load of rubbish," he says incisively. I presume that Minerva won't be doing the paperback.
Richard Charkin then sent Malcolm a note which went as follows (full text):
"As you're using my name to sell your book, the least you could do is send me a copy isn't it?"
Despite everything, Malcolm did then send Charkin a complimentary copy of the book, but in return received... nary a reply.
AKME, one of the world's great publishers, has followed its triumphant hardback publication of Andrew Malcolm's Making Names with a paperback. It is available at larger branches of W. H. Smug, where the controversial tome is being used to test demand for philosophy among Smug's customers.
The publishers cheekily preface the paperback with 10 pages on the history of the book and its eventual non-publication by OUP, and a chronology of subsequent legal action.
In a recent Bookseller, OUPs sales and marketing director, Simon Wratten, is quoted as saying that in recent months Smug's buying for stock of the great university press's publications has diminished. Surely the WHS/OUP feud can't be connected with Making Names?
'Bookworm'
SOMEWHAT mischievous of the Bookseller to publish as its lead letter to the editor on 17 December one from Denis Dugdale of AKME Publications of Brighton regarding trade with Iran.
Mr Dugdale points out that a recent letter in the Times protesting about the attempted murder of Salman Rushdie's Norwegian publisher was signed by, among others, Sir Roger Elliott. As well as being president of the Publishers' Association, Sir Roger was chief executive of OUP in 1989 when the venerable academic publishing house broke the worldwide embargo of the Tehran book fair to the outrage of the publishing world and much of the serious press [see Books for the Mullahs].
Readers may recall that it was the OUP under Sir Roger which failed to honour an oral commitment to publish Andrew Malcolm's philosophical treatise, Making Names, currently available from W. H. Smith. By coincidence the publisher is AKME of Brighton.
'Bookworm'