I’VE started telling people that for 16 years I’ve been working for a paper called the Sunday Herald and next week I will be working for a paper called the Herald On Sunday. It seems to raise a laugh. Perhaps it’s because they see a touch of the People’s Front of Judea in the gag, or maybe it’s because they know it's a far bigger personal story than those few tossed off words.
Here, then, are my last lines for a paper that’s taken up around a third of my life. I keep trying to think back to what things were like in 2003 when I arrived at what I thought was an utterly cool paper. Sixteen years is long enough not to quite remember how things were and how you thought the future world might turn out. But, among the many things I probably didn’t imagine is the past week of Scottish news, and that we would be watching one first minister (female) struggling to navigate what to do about the sexual misconduct allegations against the last first minister (male).
That, to me, says a great deal about where Scotland and the world have come to. It speaks of the journey that has been made in women’s rights, and what kind of behaviours we tolerate. Power structures seem, at times, like they’re on the verge of being overturned.
This world, where it’s conceivable that a political giant like Alex Salmond could fall over such allegations, true or not, is different to the one we were writing about in 2003. It’s also different from the one I reflected in 2015, when I casually described an interview meeting with Salmond in which he unexpectedly greeted me with a friendly kiss on the lips. The tone has changed – transformed by #MeToo.
But I’ve seen, and covered, many other changes in that time. The revolution, for instance, in gender identity. It’s hard to believe that back in 2014, when I wrote a piece on non-binary people in the trans community, I had barely come across the term gender fluid. There has been a profound shift, too, in how open we are about mental health. I remember when I interviewed former MSP Rosie Kane about her depression back in 2004, it seemed like she was busting some intractable taboo.
The Sunday Herald reflected that changing world and debated it. It did more than that. It told the human stories behind it. It brought to its pages tales from the unheard or powerless, and it encouraged me, and other writers – Judith Duffy and Karin Goodwin – to look at the people who were struggling in 21st century society, as well as those who were shaping it. When, for instance, the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Bill was proposed, we carried harrowing stories from women who had experienced coercion and violence.
I’ll always think of the Sunday Herald as the place that nurtured my feminism and social awareness, as well as my journalism. Interviews with big names were part of that. But, above all, it was my meetings with everyday people who talked of their lives, dramas, challenges, and frustrations, that shaped my world view.
I mourn already the loss of the old Sunday Herald. I felt an immense pride at being part of the team here, of being read alongside such greats at Ian Bell, Iain Macwhirter, David Pratt, Joanna Blythman and Tom Shields. The editors I worked for were inspiring. But the world shifts. The industry moves.
What doesn’t change is the need for stories. Hence, I look forward to bringing them to the new hope, the Herald On Sunday.
Here's to all those good times
Did I forget to mention the fun? For, at least back in the early years, the Sunday Herald felt like it was a paper that was almost up for anything. Whatever madcap idea you had, there was a chance you could give it a go. Within my first couple of years I’d camped in the snow-blanketed woods with the Naked Rambler, been wolf-tracking in Poland, tried out as a commis chef at Andrew Fairlie’s. But others were pushing the envelope further. As Peter Ross, whose features writing lit up the paper for many years put it, in a tweet: “ The Sunday Herald was a blast at times. It felt like you could just do stuff.”
In fact, no one really describes it – or, for that matter, anything – better than Ross. “In those days,” he says, “it was hardly a hard-bitten news room. It was more Girl On A Motorcycle than His Girl Friday: full of louche, bohemian types talking about fonts. I remember one colleague – I won’t name him, but it was Barry Didcock – turned up one day in sandals with his toenails painted blue. I remember we commissioned Edwin Morgan to review The Phantom Menace. Not sure what poor Eddie did to deserve that particular assignment. I think it was Pat Kane’s idea. Anything seemed possible, failure most of all. Every week there seemed to be another meeting at which graphs were wheeled out to suggest that we were probably doomed but might not be.”
So here we are. Doom comes knocking for the Sunday Herald. But, as they say every death is a new beginning. Here’s hoping, whatever happens, it’s a blast.
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