*LEGAL EXPLANATION (rf The Remedy, page 50.)
The law allows that all documents (and recordings of conversations) that are generated with a view to taking legal action, are privileged, that is, unlike all other relevant documents pertaining to a matter in issue, they can be withheld from the evidence. Given that Richard Charkin's letter to me of 16th July 1985 constituted, in itself, a breach (the first of two) of Oxford's contract, my subsequent telephone conversations with Henry Hardy (this one and those following) were therefore held to be privileged and did not appear in the Trial or Appeal Court files (hence the a, b, c... numbering). By the time of the Damages Assessment proceedings however, certain passages in these conversations (e.g. Hardy's remarks about how he had planned to publish Making Names) had become relevant to these new issues, so their transcripts were then produced, to the delight of Oxford's City solicitors Clifford Chance, whose staff promptly spent hundreds of lucrative hours fruitlessly dissecting them. Case-students who wish to retrace the steps taken by the Trial and Appeal Courts should therefore now proceed straight to the next item in the original files and perhaps revisit these conversations later, while intrepid, carefree psycho-voyeurs may wish to read on now. - A. M.
PREAMBLE (extract from The Remedy, page 33 &ff.)
So far, whenever Hardy had telephoned me, he had found me in, and every time, I had more or less directly picked up my receiver. But on 18th July, by chance I was out, and when he telephoned he for the first time heard my answerphone, on which in a clearly worried voice he left a message asking me to ring him, urgently, at home. He immediately followed this with a handwritten letter repeating the request. Before our next conversation it was thus clear to me that something had gone wrong, and revealed to him that I had an answering machine. It may have occurred to him then that I had made recordings of our earlier conversations; we were both forewarned of the impending deluge... As requested, fearing the worst but not imagining anything nearly as bad as the truth, I telephoned Hardy on 18th July... I believe that Hardy's absurd reinvention of the history (see below) was also a test; not only of how I would react to the obviously imminent bad news, but also of his uppermost fear, that I had kept notes of our conversations, or perhaps even taped them. Even now I can remember clearly the racing of my brain through those split seconds as the stench of dissembling and betrayal wafted unmistakably from the earpiece. My first emotions, of course, were despair and anger, my first impulses protest and denunciation, but as he stammered on through his charade, a quieter, steelier instinct took over: "I'm being fucked over here, that's that; there's no point in making a scene, no point in confronting him with recordings, he'll only go defensive and clam up. No, stay calm, play dumb, and you may find out what's happened." So, I stayed calm, played dumb, and sure enough, Hardy talked... When he had satisfied himself that I was not going to erupt with rage and that I had not recorded our previous conversation, so leaving him free to rescript it, he audibly relaxed and his emotions freed. During a series of exchanges, the truth, and the true source of his tension, emerged...
Hardy: (gloomy tone) Is that Andrew Malcolm?
Malcolm: It is yes, hello Henry.
Hardy: Hello. How are you?
Malcolm: Erm, fairly exhausted.
Hardy: Oh dear. What have you been doing?
Malcolm: Well, since I last spoke you, which is about a month ago I suppose, or more...
Hardy: Is it that long? Yes.
Malcolm: Yes, or I last wrote to you I should say, I have been doing various building jobs, for want of a better word, that I had to get out of the way before being able to do any writing.
Hardy: You haven't done any writing yet?
Malcolm: I haven't done any writing yet, but I was planning to move to this country house this coming weekend, but, er, that has actually had a bit of a setback too. It is a long story, but the guy is alright about it but his wife is making slightly unpleasant noises in the background, which makes me think it is probably a bad idea to get involved. So I may well just either go off somewhere else and do it or stay put and do it.
Hardy: Mm.
Malcolm: But I was in any case about to ring you because I think I wanted, before I'd really got down to anything, to get quite clear where we stood.
Hardy: Well that's what I want to do for a new reason which I must now explain to you. Erm, I'm hoping you have got a good memory, because unwisely when I rang you that time, shortly after I think finishing reading the typescript myself, to say that we liked it, erm, I didn't confirm our conversation in a letter.
Malcolm: Not exactly, no.
Hardy: I sort of alluded to it in subsequent letters but I didn't set out everything I said in those terms.
Malcolm: That's right.
Hardy: Can you remember, um, exactly what I said? I mean I... That is to say, what sort of cautions did I express, erm, in saying that, erm, we wanted to go ahead?
Malcolm: In terms of the rewriting?
Hardy: No, in terms of the conditions that were to be put on acceptance of the rewritten version?
Malcolm: Well you basically said as long as it wasn't worse, as long as it didn't come back to you radically worse than it is at the moment...
Hardy: Yes.
Malcolm: I think that was the basic caveat.
Hardy: One thing I was saying, just confirm, confirm whether this fits in with, with, with your memory, was that I, I, I drew your attention to the fact that the contract has, er, a clause in it which specifies that the typescript as delivered must be acceptable.
Malcolm: Y-yes.
Hardy: And that, that this clause did apply, erm, and therefore it gave us, erm, the chance to say we, erm...
Malcolm: It gave you a let-out clause.
Hardy: It gave us a let-out if you felt, if one felt that the typescript just wasn't up to scratch when it came in, but that obviously, erm, I expected, given the quality of the original typescript that it would be okay.
Malcolm: Y-yes.
Hardy: If you followed this spirit of our comments.
Malcolm: Y-yes.
Hardy: That's roughly it.
Malcolm: The thing that I was going to phone you about, because I wasn't quite clear, because between the two conversations... We had one conversation before you had finished it where you expressed a lot of reservations about the length and the scientific passages and so on, and then, happy to say, when you phoned back a month later having finished it, your tune on a number of things seemed to have changed.
Hardy: That's right.
Malcolm: So I wanted to have a detailed chat with you about exactly what you are expecting to come back.
Hardy: Right. Before we get on to that, can I just, erm, ask you whether I told you something else. I do, er, again I do remember telling you but, erm, it is the kind of thing that's a bit internal to the Press and so it might not have stuck in your mind even though I did say it.
Malcolm: Y-yes.
Hardy: That is to say that we have a procedure here which, erm, involves filling in a form on which one writes things like the length of the book and the number of copies one wants to print and, er, has an estimate made of how much it will cost to produce. And then this form has to be signed by the Publisher, erm, before a contract can be issued.
Malcolm: Oh I see. I didn't know there was an actual form. That's your department is it?
Hardy: Well, I didn't mention the form, but I mentioned... Did I mention there was some kind of formal procedure to be gone through?
Malcolm: A 'casting-off'.
Hardy: Ah, that's different.
Malcolm: Oh is it?
Hardy: That's the counting of the typescript.
Malcolm: No, I didn't hear of any formal procedure, I heard of the casting-off.
Hardy: Are you sure about that?
Malcolm: Yes, yes, yes, absolutely sure about that.
Hardy: Right... Now that's erm... Now let me explain why I am going into all this rather boring detail. There is this formal procedure. I mean, may I just explain, that is to say, erm, you know, when the cast-off is done, erm, which has now happened, and I'll tell you what the result of that was if I haven't already done so, erm, one fills in this form which says, you know, it will cost so many thousand pounds to print so many copies, and then this form goes to a meeting at which all new publishing proposals are considered, and the investment decision is formally approved by the man who signs the cheques.
Malcolm: Yes.
Hardy: I thought I had explained that to you but evidently I didn't, anyway...
Malcolm: No, I imagined something like that would happen, but I didn't actually hear that.
Hardy: Now normally... the thing is that... erm, technically, in telling you that I wanted to go ahead before that form had been signed, I was jumping the gun.
Malcolm: Jumping the gun?
Hardy: And I did it in this case as I do in countless others and so do many other editors because, you know, normally speaking the signing of the form is a formality...
Malcolm: Y-yes.
Hardy: Erm, now...
Malcolm: Is there some bad news on the way or what?
Hardy: Well it's... I don't know how bad it is going to be, erm... Unfortunately the, erm, the managing director, who isn't actually the man who signs the form, he is the next one down in the hierarchy, was at the meeting at which the form was submitted and as I thought was going to go through in the usual way without any problems...
Malcolm: Yes.
Hardy: ...took strongly against the book. Quite wrongly, I think, and I am, er, I am arguing strongly against it, but so far this form has not been signed and he has, erm... for reasons I, I, as I say, I just don't understand, he's, he's treating the matter very seriously, to the extent, I mean let me let me plunge myself into the shit along with you...
Malcolm: Prlll...
Hardy: ...he has treated this as a disciplinary matter, which is quite new to me, I mean I've been working here for eight years and this has never happened before.
Malcolm: Oh no!
Hardy: He has given me what's called a "stage three disciplinary warning".
Malcolm: Good God!
Hardy: Which is horrifying.
Malcolm: Pulling rank.
Hardy: What?
Malcolm: Pulling rank.
Hardy: That is so it, yes.
Malcolm: Can I just butt in. On what grounds has he taken against it? Purely from an investment point of view, or has he read it, or...?
Hardy: Well he thinks... He certainly hasn't read it, erm, no, and I think he is therefore jumping to conclusions. We have now, as a result of an earlier disquiet expressed by him, or expressed by somebody at an earlier stage, I'm not quite sure who, I was on holiday at the time, had another report on the typescript, which I am glad to to say was just about as favourable as mine and Alan Ryan's.
Malcolm: Oh really? So someone else has read it completely?
Hardy: Well, he read most of it and... I will quote you the nice bits just to cheer you up before we go on: "Making Names is really quite an attractive book. It is in no way crazy. It is very easy to read. Malcolm has a real gift for informal exposition. He is very clear and he knows what he's talking about. Making Names might prove extremely effective as an introduction to philosophical problems and procedures if appropriately revised, and so on".
Malcolm: Oh, that's nice.
Hardy: I will perhaps send you the whole thing, because he does have some reservations, the chief of which and the one you will like the least, is that he doesn't think that the last chapter works, but, er, I know that you won't approve of that reaction.
Malcolm: Mm, yes.
Hardy: Anyway....
Malcolm: Well, he might be right. I mean, it's a question of whether the whole thing works.
Hardy: What!?
Malcolm: Well, I mean that is a question about whether the philosophy works in a sense isn't it?
Hardy: I know that you regard the last chapter as integral to the whole in a way which I haven't myself quite grasped yet, but anyway, that is in a sense by-the-by. And, to become more practical again, the name of the managing director is Richard Charkin, and he either has written and sent or will shortly do so a letter to you which I think is quite... It won't be too alarming... I mean he's not particularly rude to you or anything, as he was to me, but saying that he is not prepared to, in this case as he usually does, endorse my, erm, commitment to you at this stage. He is not prepared, that is to say, to allow me to send you a contract before the book is a rewritten.
Malcolm: Y-y-yes (sighing).
Hardy: I haven't seen the letter yet, I hope to see it soon. He goes on to say, I understand, that of course you, erm, are free to resubmit it when you have worked it, but I think he then goes on to say that he thinks its chances of being accepted at that stage, even if you have revised it according to what Alan and Ryan and I have said, are not high. Now...
Malcolm: (desolately) On what grounds then?
Hardy: Well, a mixture of grounds. I mean first of all he is not as sanguine about the commercial potential of the book as I am, that is one side of it. Secondly, his reading of the actual written reaction of Alan Ryan is different from mine, that is to say he regards his support for the book as more grudging than I, but of course he hasn't had the telephone conversations with Alan Ryan that I have had subsequently, nor has he inquired... I mean, sorry, before I go any further, perhaps I could say that I think that Richard Charkin... I mean it, you know, I shouldn't say this in a way as an employee, but, you know, in this situation I don't think I can say anything different: I think he is dead wrong about this.
Malcolm: Yes.
Hardy: And I am doing everything I can do to convince him of that, if only because I have made a commitment to you which I think we should honour collectively... But I have got to tell you; I can't keep you in the dark about what is going on.
Malcolm: Yes.
Hardy: I think he has vastly over-reacted. Even if he thought I was wrong, I think he has vastly over-reacted, and I don't, don't quite understand why... Anyway, er...
Malcolm: Is he a scientist, or...?
Hardy: His own training is in medicine, I think, possibly science.
Malcolm: Hm.
Hardy: He's certainly not a philosopher and wouldn't claim to know anything about it and as I say he hasn't even attempted to read the book at all.
Malcolm: Yes, but I mean maybe the basic idea that it is anti-scientific is in some way a basic distrust of it.
Hardy: No, no, no, he hasn't got as far as actually inquiring into the contents of the book, I regret to say. Now... what, what, what I am anxious about... I mean first, apart from just apologising to you, erm, because indeed I did jump the gun in that way, but, you know, it is a regular occurrence and I thought that there was no danger in doing so... If I had realised that this was likely or even possibly going to happen I would have said to you: look, I like it, but we have got to go through this procedure.
Malcolm: This procedure, yup.
Hardy: And until we have gone through this procedure I can't erm, make any commitment.
Malcolm: Yup.
Hardy: But I knew that you were anxious to hear the result, I knew that we had taken an awfully long time to read the typescript and you wanted to get on with it, and also, as I say, I didn't think that it was more than a formality, so, you know, on what I knew and understood at the time I thought I was on safe ground. But knowing, particularly, how much you care about the book and how pleased you were to think it was going to be published, I am, I am very upset that we should go back on this in any way.
Malcolm: So, the upshot of all this is that?
Hardy: The upshot of all this is, well, um, I mean...
Malcolm: It looks like a thumbs-down in fact.
Hardy: Pardon?
Malcolm: It looks like a thumbs-down.
Hardy: Well, let me ask you a question: how do you feel about, erm, taking the risk? I mean you said to me... The reason I offered you a contract at that stage was that you said to me that you didn't feel able to put in the psychological effort involved in rewriting unless you had some sort of a commitment.
Malcolm: Yes.
Hardy: And I well understood that.
Malcolm: Well I'm certainly not going to rewrite it in possession of a letter which says that even if I do I've got a pretty slim chance of having it accepted, obviously.
Hardy: Right. (sadly) I was afraid you would say that.
Malcolm: I mean if his objections to it are not on the basis that it needs rewriting, and he hasn't got even to that stage, if it is basically an investment decision, then there is no point is there? I mean it won't matter, it won't be that much shorter, or whatever.
Hardy: That's a large part of it I think, yes. Erm, now, I shall expect you to be rather upset about all this.
Malcolm: Mmm.
Hardy: Perhaps you can't say straight off.
Malcolm: Well I've got utterly cynical about the whole, about everything really, so... um...
Hardy: Hasn't that condition been altered at all by the prospect of actually getting this thing out?
Malcolm: Well, yes, but I had been maintaining an internal cynicism about the prospect of getting it out.
Hardy: Right.
Malcolm: Which has obviously now come true.
Hardy: Which is justified in view of the position where we are now.
Malcolm: Yes.
Hardy: What Alan Ryan's line is that... Well, Alan Ryan hopes that you will still be prepared to go ahead and do it, but obviously if you don't feel you can put in the work without the commitment then we aren't going to have a chance.
Malcolm: Well, if I mean if someone who, rank-wise, is above you and Alan Ryan and has the power in the end to say yea or nay has said your chances of getting it accepted whatever you do to it are extremely slim, if I'm going to get a letter like that, obviously I am not going to write it.
Hardy: No.
Malcolm: Unless you and Alan have got contacts with another publisher or something.
Hardy: Right, well there is that possibility as well. Alan Ryan is not... I mean Richard Charkin isn't above Alan Ryan in the sense that Alan Ryan is a Delegate, that is to say he is one of the committee of dons who, er, officially run the Press, and Richard Charkin is the managing director of the business side of it, so neither is really one above or below the other.
Malcolm: Mm.
Hardy: I mean my personal feeling is that I have taken on a responsibility to get this book published and if I can't do it through my position at the Press, I want to do everything else I can, you know, by way of seeking alternatives, which I haven't really started thinking about yet because I, er, wanted to see how you felt about it.
Malcolm: Mm. Well... obviously... you know, if there is someone in charge of the purse-strings who doesn't like the sound of it then there is not much you or I can do about it.
Hardy: That's very philosophical of you. I think it is right, at the moment. I mean there is the possibility of persuading him he is wrong of course, but, erm...
Malcolm: What is going to do that if he is of this opinion without having read it?
Hardy: Yup.
Malcolm: Without having any idea of what it's about?
Hardy: Yup.
Malcolm: I mean there's really no point in rewriting it... Maybe there would be some point in...
Hardy: No, the only thing you could do to him is to persuade him that...
Malcolm: ...drive a battered MG around Oxford and aim it at him. (A reference to how the two protagonists in Making Names first meet.)
Hardy: (chuckles) Yes, yes... Well, I feel that this is a rather a lame conversation. I am very very sorry about it. I suppose with hindsight I was wrong to encourage you as I did, and I truly believe that I was doing so responsibly and, er, I would do the same again. I think his reaction to... hold on a second would you (someone comes into Hardy's Office) ... his reaction to, erm, what he believed was my mistake, as I say, is ludicrously out of proportion.
Malcolm: It has become a sort of rank matter between you and him, with the book just pig-in-the-middle.
Hardy: It has become a power-struggle thing between him and me, yes. I don't quite know why he has chosen this particular issue.
Malcolm: Because you are clearly in the wrong.
Hardy: Well I am clearly in the wrong technically in that I didn't wait until the appropriate point before encouraging you to think we were going to go ahead, but as I say one does this all the time, because otherwise people would be kept waiting for ages.
Malcolm: Well...
Hardy: If you want to wait until you see the letter and talk again, please do. If, as I say, if there is anything I can do... To become totally trivial for a moment, let me just tell you that the book was cast off at 475 pages, making certain assumptions about how it would be typeset, and the costings I did for the form which I hoped would go through were based on the assumption that you would be able to reduce that at least to 400 pages and probably further. That may seem to you a a very modest cut, but that was the assumption I made which I thought, given what you had said to me, was probably about right.
Malcolm: Uhuh? And on the basis of that were there any costings and any rough idea of how much the thing would be priced in the shops and so on?
Hardy: Yes, done as a hardback alone, which was the way I wanted to put it through at that stage, in order to get it approved, because I think that is the way that would be most likely to recommend itself to this guy Charkin and the other people who are involved in authorising the contract, it would have to be £15, which I think I told you was likely... When the book finally comes in as a typescript and is put into production one has a chance obviously to review the decision one has made about how to publish it, and one might at that point get different costings for doing it simultaneously in hardback and paperback, which I think was probably the way I would like, I would have liked, to do it, in which case the hardback might be a little more expensive and the paperback considerably cheaper.
Malcolm: Yes, that sounds good, yup.
Hardy: That's the way I was thinking of it.
Malcolm: That would have sounded good. Er, um, yes. Well, I don't know, but by the sound of this letter I am about to get... I am about to receive it am I?
Hardy: Well I expect it hasn't gone first-class and I would expect that it has been posted today or will be posted tomorrow, so I wouldn't expect you to get it until the middle of next week probably.
Malcolm: Will it demand or expect a reply?
Hardy: I don't think it will call for a reply, as far as I understand. I mean it will be open to you to reply if you want to. I wouldn't have thought there was any point... It depends what you wanted to say, erm...
Malcolm: Mmm.
Hardy: There is no point in disagreeing with him, but, er, if you want to say that you think he should stick by his editors or something like that you could, but I mean there is no point particularly. That would just be... How do you anticipate wanting to deal with it?
Malcolm: (gurgling noises) Er, I don't know.
Hardy: Not until you have read it I guess.
Malcolm: Erm... I was going to say if, assuming the contents are roughly as you have described them, then what I would like, I would appreciate, is firstly the manuscript back.
Hardy: Of course.
Malcolm: And secondly copies of the reports that we have had from Alan Ryan and this other guy.
Hardy: Yes.
Malcolm: And if possible a kind of recommendation from yourself, or someone, so that I can take it off to other publishers.
Hardy: I can certainly do all of that, and what I would like to suggest further is that I think about the kind of publishers you might feel that this suited, some of whom I know personally.
Malcolm: I warn you, I have tried them all.
Hardy: You have tried them all?
Malcolm: None of them has even read it.
Hardy: Really? Have you tried Fontana?
Malcolm: Oh yes. None of them. Hardly anyone asked to see it. Blackwell's asked to see it and then didn't read it for six months. It sat on the woman's filing cabinet apparently.
Hardy: Oh really? Who was that? Perhaps you can't remember the name.
Malcolm: Yes I can, it's, wait a minute... Pipkin or something?
Hardy: Pickin?
Malcolm: Pickin, yes.
Hardy: Pickin, yes. Who was it at Fontana, do you remember?
Malcolm: No. I don't think he'd even got...
Hardy: As far as having a nose?
Malcolm: No.
Hardy: Just a straight rejection?
Malcolm: Yes. As I say, no one, hardly, even asked to to see the manuscript.
Hardy: No.
Malcolm: None of the people... Deutsch read one chapter or something, asked me to send them the first chapter.
Hardy: Yup. Oh dear oh dear oh dear. Erm, well, I will go on thinking... Have you tried Dent for example?
Malcolm: I think so, yes, probably.
Hardy: So you really have tried a very large number?
Malcolm: Oh I've got files, yeah, files. I mean I tried them all years ago. The funny thing was when I first tried, I just marched into the Penguin office - it was in Victoria then - without any appointment or anything, and demanded to see the philosophy editor, and from there one thing led to another and for six months it looked as though they were going to do it, and it was then just a bundle of notes.
Hardy: Yes.
Malcolm: But that and this time with you is really as close as I have ever got.
Hardy: Yes. Was it somebody at Penguins who encouraged you to rewrite it and then left by the time you had done so?
Malcolm: Yes, that was one of the sketches, yes.
Hardy: That was at Penguins?
Malcolm: That was at Penguins, yes. I rewrote it and then it went back to them and they hummed and hahed about it again.
Hardy: Yup.
Malcolm: And then, they finally rejected it.
Hardy: Yup.
Malcolm: With certain remarks that if I put it all into the dialogue form they would reconsider it.
Hardy: Which you did.
Malcolm: Which I did and then he had gone.
Hardy: By that time some body had usurped him?
Malcolm: Yes. Oh, and there was Allen and Unwin also.
Hardy: Yes.
Malcolm: That was the same again. They had both left, that's right.
Hardy: Hmm... Well I will go on searching my mind, and I will ask you again if I think of some other people whether you have tried them already, although sometimes you get a different response from a firm if you try after a period of years, because people have moved on and left.
Malcolm: Yes. I must say I have rather run out of energy on the whole thing.
Hardy: I am sure you have. I mean, I don't know whether you would prefer me not to have encouraged you at all if I was going to have to disappoint you in the end rather than luring you into thinking it might really be happening.
Malcolm: Y-yes, well, er, um, it was nice to have found someone who actually read it. That is the main encouragement.
Hardy: Well, I feel grateful to you for not being crosser with me. I mean I don't in fact think I erred that much in what I did, but as it has turned out from your point of view, obviously I erred very seriously, erm...
Malcolm: Has the period of time after reading the book... have you been thinking about it, does it still strike you as good?
Hardy: I still feel the same way about it, yes. I mean I haven't read...
Malcolm: Not as a book, but the philosophy, the ideas. Have they, do they still makes sense to you?
Hardy: Yes! I mean I cannot remember all the particular ones, but I remember... What sticks most in my mind is your attack on the metaphysical implications of modern particle physics, their ontological bases as objects, that struck a very strong chord with me at the time when I read it because I have always felt that way myself about particle physics, as presented, at least, in the popular press, and yours was the first account I had read which came straight out and said this does not makes sense.
Malcolm: Mm.
Hardy: And that stays with me. I don't feel I got the full import of the play and I think that I am going to read that again, even if I send you the typescript back, because maybe I will get more out of it the second time round. The earlier parts of the typescript, the more non-scientific parts, although I thought they were good and well written and clear and so forth, as the whole typescript is, the actual theses you had to put forward for some reason at the time struck me less forcibly than the scientific one, which I think is probably the one that means as much to you as any of the others isn't it?
Malcolm: Well, the whole thing adds up, it seems to me.
Hardy: As an integral whole.
Malcolm: Mm.
Hardy: In fact I think what I will do is, erm, I'll take, if I may, a photocopy of the whole thing before I send it back to you, so that I can read it again.
Malcolm: Well in that case hold on to it and read it again. There is no urgency about having it back because I've got another copy.
Hardy: Okay. Right. Well look, I could go on indefinitely repeating myself, but there is nothing more to say really, except that I will continue to... I mean, I think the chances of reversing the situation here are getting slimmer, and my own job is now on the line, in the sense that I have been given a warning which is preparatory to dismissal for doing this.
Malcolm: It is that bad?
Hardy: It is quite ludicrous! Everybody whom I have talked to thinks he has gone way over the top in reacting like this, but anyway, that is what has happened.
Malcolm: Have you other allies of his rank?
Hardy: Erm... yes... well....
Malcolm: Where is the actual managing director? You said he was away at the time or something.
Hardy: The actual?
Malcolm: The bloke, the managing director...
Hardy: No, Charkin is the managing director. The man who actually signs the form is called the Oxford Publisher. I mean it's a hierarchical structure which I can't expect you to be interested in, but he is not away, no... as luck would have it, he wasn't at this meeting and the managing director was, and they are both sort of involved in decisions of this kind, although in fact it's Robin Denniston the Oxford Publisher who signs the form and indeed, the book had been discussed with him before the meeting and he hadn't raised any strong objections to it, and, you know, if it hadn't been for this direction on the part of Charkin, he would have just responded.
Malcolm: Mm. Is there any kind of politicking that can be done to reverse this? This is all your department, but...
Hardy: Well, I have not totally given up hope of this... Some of it is already being done in the sense that, as I say, Alan Ryan is fortunately a Delegate and therefore has some authority over, a sort of ill-defined authority over the officers of the Press. He spoke to Charkin on the phone this morning and tried to persuade him he was making a mistake about writing to you in the way that he has or proposes to do, and failed in that, but I think managed to modify, or felt that he had modified, Charkin's position to this extent, that is to say: initially Charkin was saying I don't want to publish this now and I don't want to publish it when it comes in revised, or I'm very unlikely to want to. Alan Ryan believes that when he had finished talking to Charkin, Charkin had committed himself to saying that if it came in revised and if it was approved as okay and in need of no further revision by Alan Ryan or by some other adviser, then perhaps it could go ahead.
Malcolm: But this...
Hardy: But I mean I can certainly clarify that for you, and it may probably be clearer when the letter arrives.
Malcolm: Yes, well, I think... Will you be able to find out the contents of the letter or do you want me to phone you up?
Hardy: The letter will... I am sure the letter will be on file, and then, when the file comes back.... The reason I can't look at it now is that the file is with Charkin and he is not in the office this afternoon, so I don't know where he has put it, so perhaps tomorrow I shall get hold of it.
Malcolm: Mm.
Hardy: I mean, if you like, as soon as I see the letter, I can ring you and read it to you over the phone.
Malcolm: Well, I was going to say that I could do the same for you.
Hardy: Well that's kind, but I don't think he will treat it as confidential to the file, there is no reason why he should.
Malcolm: Yup.
Hardy: And, as I say, I could try and get it absolutely clear on that... But, but, but, one wonders if it is worth it because if, supposing it becomes clear that Richard Charkin has committed himself to allowing it through if the revision is successful and is approved; from what you say, that isn't enough for you.
Malcolm: Well, it depends what the letter says, but the whole thing, unfortunately, now sounds like it is a matter of personal pride.
Hardy: I think it has become that yes.
Malcolm: And the book is now a kind of irrelevant pawn in Charkin's power-games or whatever, and he would lose a lot of face by now accepting it.
Hardy: I think he would, yes, and I think he is not somebody who will lose face, I am afraid. Erm... There are more high-level politickings which I have contemplated doing, but they would have very serious implications for me and my career, and I don't know if they would be effective.
Malcolm: Mm.
Hardy: The trouble is that I'm not on the strongest possible ground.
Malcolm: Mm.
Hardy: If, at the original time the form had been signed and I had then offered you the contract as we had been suggesting, then whatever his objections Richard might not have intervened.
Malcolm: So in fact, if you had been less definite and it had gone through the normal procedures, none of this might have happened, he might have...
Hardy: No, no, that is not so, no.
Malcolm: Ah. I see, he...
Hardy: It isn't because I... No, no, he had taken disquiet against the thing before, on the phone; he had already made trouble and requested a third opinion. I mean that was regarded as a compounding error, but it wasn't why he took against it at all.
Malcolm: Mm.
Hardy: No, I don't think that.
Malcolm: Well, yes, I don't know. It all sounds pretty... I don't know about the internal politics, but it does not sound good, does it?
Hardy: I cannot stop thinking about it.
Malcolm: But I mean, maybe, maybe, (sinking) maybe it would be good to send the manuscript back to me. You take your copy of the play or whatever you want to read and then send it back.
Hardy: Yup. Right.
Malcolm: And then it's sort of out of Jerkin's hair. What is his name?
Hardy: Charkin.
Malcolm: Charkin?
Hardy: Charkin. C-h-a-r-k-i-n.
Malcolm: Right. There must be some anagrams of that.
Hardy: (chuckles) Yes... Okay, I will do that, and I will certainly take a copy of the whole thing because I don't want to lose touch with it. I mean, I feel personally committed to it.
Malcolm: Oh, thanks for that.
Hardy: Particularly after what has been happening.
Malcolm: Yes, well I hope it deserves that commitment, aside of what has been happening.
Hardy: Well, yes, for that reason too. What I mean is the commitment I had to it has been strengthened by all of this.
Malcolm: It is great to know that one is being turned down by someone who hasn't even looked at it.
Hardy: Right. Okay, well let us talk again when you have seen the letter and see if you think in the light of that it is worth doing the labour.
Malcolm: Yes.
Hardy: Alright?
Malcolm: Okay, yes, I will wait for the letter to come, and then...
Hardy: Okay? If I see the copy of the letter in the next couple of days, do you want me to ring you and tell you what is in it?
Malcolm: No, perhaps you had better give me a couple of days to simmer down.
Hardy: I will wait until you have seen the letter yourself then, and come back to me.
Malcolm: Okay.
Hardy: Alright?
Malcolm: Yup.
Hardy: Thanks very much.
Malcolm: Okay.
Hardy: Bye-bye.
Malcolm: Cheers.
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Go to Malcolm's Statement of Claim, to the Case History, to the Affidavits: Ivon Asquith (1), Asquith (2), Henry Hardy, William Shaw (solicitor) (1), Sir Roger Elliott (1), Margaret Goodall, to the Witness Statements: Elliott, Hardy, Richard Charkin, Nicola Bion, Goodall, to the courtroom testimony of the Oxford Six, 14/3/1990: Elliott, Goodall, Bion, Asquith, Charkin, Hardy, to the testimony of Andrew Malcolm 13/3/1990, to the Chancery Court Judgment, the Appeal Court Judgment, the Damages assessment, the Settlement agreement.
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