03/10/2008

Over the next few weeks, allmediascotland.com is to publish, each weekday, extracts from the memoirs of Scottish war correspondent, Paul Harris. ‘More Thrills than Skills: A Half-life in Journalism’, is being scheduled for publication next year.

These days, such books are ten a penny but in the mid-1970s this was still controversial and highly original publishing. I encouraged Tuppy to rewrite it for the British market with a new title, Take Me I’m Yours: A Guide to Feminine Psychology. The brilliant title came to me in the bath one day as a tune with the lilting line ‘take me I’m yours’ came over on the radio. This was, of course, long before the days political correctness intruded upon the scene.

Tuppy did a good job with it and we went off to Frankfurt to the Book Fair and proceeded to whip up enthusiasm for the book.

On day three, a new publisher, Mirror Books, part of the Robert Maxwell empire, offered a £10,000 advance for the UK paperback publishing rights. This was a cause for celebration. When I got back there was a contract on the desk which I signed with alacrity and sent back to Mirror. A long silence ensued . . .  then came a bland proforma letter from Mirror Group saying they were closing Mirror Books, before it actually got going in business. This was very disappointing news, to put it mildly.

I then decided to try and bluff Mirror into paying. I hit the telex (this was before e-mails, faxes even) and sternly advised that intention to contract meant that they must still pay us the money (arguably true in law) but, furthermore, as they were an England-registered company and we were a Scotland-registered business, then our making a claim in court in Scotland meant that we would automatically get a court order under Scots Law known as ‘an inhibition’, preventing distribution of any English Mirror Group newspapers in Scotland.

I implied that all this was automatic under Scots Law. I knew that no English lawyer knew virtually anything about Scots Law and to try and pre-empt inquiries in Scotland I put on a time limit for payment of our money of just 48 hours. It was pure bluff, but I got a telex back saying that ‘in the unusual circumstances’ the contract would be upheld, and a cheque for £10,000 appeared on the mat two days later.

The important thing then was to get what is known in the business as ‘reversion of rights’. So I asked Mirror if they wished to retain any rights in the book. No, they said. I then remembered that a former colleague at the university newspaper was on the features desk at the tabloid newspaper, The Sun, in London. Over a boozy lunch at El Vino’s on Fleet Street, the UK serial rights for Tuppy’s book were sold . . . for another £10,000. Ten thousand may not be a lot these days, but then it would buy a very substantial apartment or small house.

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