Simon Heffer The "Daily Telegraph" Style Guide

Annotation

Profession is a term that can only be applied to certain learned or chartered callings: the law, medicine, the civil service...Other callings, such as journalism, are trades. Erupt is what volcanoes and pustules do. Rows, arguments and other disputes break out. High street as an adjective is often redundant: shops, banks and other emporia to which it is applied are rarely found in the middle of fields. The Telegraph newspapers maintain their high standards of accuracy, literacy and grammar thanks to a comprehensive style book used by all their journalists, covering everything from the correct title of a baron to the spelling of Gorden Kaye's Christian name when writing about Allo, Allo. But its rigour and exactitude are complemented by a deliciously baleful, even testy, wit - a quality much valued by, and indeed demonstrated by, its own readership in Aurum's hugely successful Unpublished Letters book of Christmas 2009, Am I Alone in Thinking...? As a result this style guide is a uniquely enjoyable and frequently very funny read in itself. Now Aurum publishes a trade edition, as a handsome little hardback volume, decorated with a cover cartoon by Matt. It will be an essential addition to the bookshelf of anyone who has to write for public consumption, but will also make an ideal gift.