Murdoch's Minions (The Last Thursday in July - Andrew Hanscombe)

Member Name: amygdala

Product:	The Last Thursday in July - Andrew Hanscombe
Date:	15/05/01 (364 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Creates a context for the stories so many of us (me included) like to read.

Disadvantages: You know the tabloids will behave like this again.

It would have been very difficult to say anything negative about this book, which tells the story of André Hanscombe and the son he had had with Rachel Nickell, the young woman stabbed to death on Wimbledon Common in 1992.

Fortunately there is nothing negative to say about the book itself, because The Last Thursday in July is well-written, dignified, and moving. It isn't a true-crime book: it's a true-life book, describing what happens to those close to a murder victim who has captured the attention of the media. Hanscombe recognizes clearly enough why his girlfriend did this: she was blonde, white, good-looking, innocent, and died in a particularly dreadful way in a particularly public place. The publishers have apparently recognized this too, because the cover photograph of Rachell Nickell seems to have been treated to emphasize her blonde hair.

In other words, even in this small way, her story is still being exploited for emotion in the pursuit of profit. And that is why Hanscombe seems to have written this book. Not to continue the exploitation, but to protest against it. If you thought you knew how bad British tabloid newspapers could be, you should probably think again unless you've already read this book. As Evelyn Waugh's Scoop proves, the newspaper tradition of turning pain into profit is a long and dishonorable one:

"Shumble, Whelper, and Pigge knew Corker: they had loitered together on many a doorstep and forced a way into many a stricken home." (Pt 2, ch 1, sec iii)

Waugh wrote that in 1938; Hanscombe saw the same thing happening in the 1990s, at first hand, as the newspapers run by the born-again Christian Rupert Murdoch and his competitors competed first to kick him when he was down and then, when he was struggling back to his feet, to knock him back down and kick him again. Although Hanscombe's and Nickell's son was the only witness to the murder and so in great danger from the murd
erer, his photograph was published in two tabloid newspapers without any attempt at to disguise his features.

And so it continued, culminating, perhaps, at the inquest into Rachell Nickell's death, when, after giving evidence, Hanscombe left the court ready to return home on his motorbike:

"I was asked by someone if I wanted to make a statement to the press. They must have been joking! My statement would have contained only two words.

"One of the policemen had come by bike as well. I waited until he was ready and we went out the back way together. My emotions were a mess and my head was spinning. It was an effort to put one foot in front of another. I was trying hard to pull myself together for the ride home.

"As we went through the door we were confronted with a battery of lenses aimed in our direction. Once again it was like walking out in front of a firing squad. They had been kept back in the road by the uniformed police but were climbing over each other for an angle. I held my helmet up in front of my face as I walked and turned my back on them when I reached my bike. I could hear them calling for me to turn round. Fuck them!

"And then, like a horde of savages, they began to jeer. The idea must have been to surprise me into turning round. I was taken by surprise but just managed to stop myself from spinning on my heel and giving them what they wanted. The jeering grew louder and louder. It was a bad impression of a pack of apes. It carried the threatening smell of a lynch mob. It was quite terrifying. I felt that if they got their hands on me they would rip me to shreds." (Chapter 22)

The man responsible for Rachell Nickell's death is a psychopath. What's Rupert Murdoch's excuse?

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