PRINT SOURCE: Thomas Raddall Fonds, Correspondence. From Thomas Raddall to Hugh MacLennan, 16 November 1960. MS-2-202 S-517.
Subject HeadingsAs the Royal Commission on Publications was looking at foreign competition facing the Canadian magazine industry in 1960, T. H. Raddall responds to a letter about the issues involved from Hugh MacLennan, noted Canadian novelist and McGill University faculty member. Raddall expresses his opposition to MacLennan's view that American magazines should be restricted in Canada. Raddall backs up his position by arguing American and Canadian magazines did not compete as they provided very different coverage, Maclean's was growing and thriving, and working class Canadians did not buy American magazines anyway.
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November 16, 1960 Dear Hugh, Your letter disturbs me, because I have a deep regard for your ideals and judgement, and yet I can find no sympathy in myself (or in anyone else on the seaboard) for the recurring efforts of the Canadian magazines to restrict the entry of U.S. magazines like Time. I hold no brief for Time. Its coverage of U.S. politics always has the Luce bias,1 and it injects the U.S. slant into world affairs. But this is done openly, even nakedly; one can recognise it and apply the salt-cellar. At the same time it gives the best world news coverage available in quick form anywhere in North America. Certainly no Canadian publication can approach it. Any attempt to make Time more expensive to the Canadian reader will bring the same reaction as the last one, which did the Canadian magazines no good at all -- to put it mildly. Also I find it hard to believe that Maclean's2 (for instance) is in any danger of being driven to the wall by American competition. One has only to look at its growth, in circulation, assets and staff, during the past twenty years. In my own observation the Canadian who subscribes to Time is usually a subscriber to Maclean's, because they cover utterly different fields and he wants the best of both. The sub-literary class just reads the funny papers. When I go into the homes of farmers, fishermen, lumbermen or mill hands I always look about me to see what sort of thing they read. Apart from the daily or weekly newspaper it's usually cheap pocketbooks of the more lurid kind. Occasionally one sees Maclean's or the Maritime Advocate.3 Time -- never. I enclose an editorial from this morning's Chronicle-Herald.4 Sincerely, Hugh MacLennanMcGill University Montreal |
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