TEXT:
To: R. A. Denniston Esquire The Oxford Publisher Oxford University Press, Walton Street OXFORD OX2 6DP
Andrew Malcolm, 7 Southover Street BRIGHTON BN2 2UA tel: 0273 688930 17th July 1986
Dear Sir
You may already be familiar with aspects of the following extraordinary story, but I think it is now time that you personally were provided with a complete, if brief account. In August 1984 I submitted to OUP a synopsis of a philosophical text I had provisionally completed called Making Names. This was passed to Mr. Henry Hardy, the Senior Editor of your General Books Division, who asked to see the typescript. This I duly sent with an explicit acknowledgement that it was in need of a six-month revision session. After some months Mr. Hardy relayed a very encouraging reader's report and sounded me out on my revision intentions. It seemed to us both that I would be able to satisfy OUP's requirements, but as I explained to him, I was unwilling to do the revision without first securing the Press's firm commitment to publish.
On 20th May 85 Mr. Hardy telephoned to tell me "Having finished the book I feel much more warmly towards it and we would like to do it. I know that you want a commitment sufficient to take you through the last stage of revision and that is what I am offering." The only condition or caveat he attached to this commitment was: "If what you do seems to us to make it worse then we would write to say so." He went on at great length about his revision requirements and concluded: "I'll be getting in touch again when I've got it properly cast off and then we can talk about some sort of contract. What I think we should agree is that you should have a fair royalty so that if the book is a success you will do well out of it." This commitment was confirmed in two letters and by the submission of a formal publicity document.
So the matter stood until 18th July when Mr. Hardy phoned to tell me that the Managing Director of OUP, a Mr. Richard Charkin had, "for reasons best known to himself and without even attempting to read the book at all or to inquire into its contents" taken against Making Names and served Mr. Hardy with a Disciplinary Warning preparatory to dismissal. Next day I received from Mr. Charkin a letter in which he reneged on OUP's commitment and made it clear that he would not authorise the book's publication howsoever it were revised, In the course of several long conversations with Mr. Hardy I was then drawn into an apparently long-running personal/political power struggle between the two men in which my book had now become a pawn: "There is an element of personality in here which has nothing to do with your book... It isn't going to get a fair hearing here now." Not wishing to jeopardise the position of the man who had committed OUP to the book's publication, I wrote a letter (22 July) in which I made it clear that although dreadfully disappointed, I bore no grudge against Mr. Hardy.
Then, however, events took an even more perverse twist. Mr. Hardy phoned and wrote to me to say that Mr. Charkin had had a change of heart and had instructed him to tell me that, after all, OUP would be interested in a revised version of Making Names.
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In several more long conversations Mr. Hardy strongly urged me to undertake the revision. Having discovered that I was dealing with an unreliable and factional organisation, I was extremely reluctant to proceed, but Mr. Hardy persisted, giving me categorical assurances on a great number of points. Finally, I agreed to do the work provided that OUP laid out all their requirements in writing. On July 31st I received a detailed list of "the changes that seem to us to be required".
In October I sent the first two new chapters to OUP, inviting comment and receiving approval. In February '86, after seven months of intensive work carried out at considerable personal cost in a number of respects, I sent the new script, complete but for certain polishing. All OUP's requirements of 30/7/85 had been fulfilled.
In May I received from a Ms. Nicola Bion, whose status at the Press is unclear, a letter rejecting Making Names in terms which seem to imply that all my past year's communications with your Senior Editor never took place. Without going into detail, every single point raised by Ms. Bion in her extraordinary letter (re. the book's length, its market prospects and so on) precisely contradicts the many judgments and assurances I had previously received at enormous length from Mr. Hardy.
In my letter of 22/7/85 I stated that "my disappointment has so far been tempered more with resignation than with anger." My disappointment is now tempered with anger As it happens, the phenomenon of anger is discussed at some length in the book, in Ch. 1, pp31-36, and it manifests itself in a particularly decisive way in Ch.9, p24; I believe OUP still holds a copy. One thing my anger has prompted me to do is to take a good deal of legal advice, hence my long delay in replying to Ms. Bion's letter. In the light of this advise I believe that Mr. Hardy's original commitment of OUP to publish Making Names provided I resubmitted it in no worse form still stands. I believe that Mr. Hardy believes that this commitment still stands; in his own words of 18/7/85, "I made a commitment to you which I think we should honour collectively". Ms. Bion has confirmed that the revised version, is "undoubtedly an improvement". In view of all these facts I feel sure that you will want to reverse Ms. Bion's 'decision' and now draw up the formal contract originally promised by Mr. Hardy. The latter made numerous references to the financial arrangements, costings etc. from which the detail of such a contract could easily be inferred. I assume that Mr. Hardy will fully corroborate this story, but should any doubts arise over detail I will be happy to produce the complete and accurate records I have kept of our 5+ hours of telephone conversations.
I am writing this letter at this stage in an attempt to avoid any further unnecessary costs which may be incurred either by myself or by OUP. Also, I would be grateful if you would give your consent for this matter to be referred to the Society of Authors.
Yours sincerely, Andrew Malcolm
Go to the next item or the previous item in the Evidence (red) file.
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.
Return to the Malcolm vs. Oxford I (1984-92) Index, to the Malcolm vs. Oxford II (2001-02) Index, to the blurb for Making Names, to its reviews, to The Remedy, or to the SITE INDEX.