frontline: a refreshing broadsheet
I grew up reading newspapers as a child. My dad would always buy the Daily Mail on Saturday and to begin with, I never used to read the newspaper and took more interest in the 'Weekender' supplement/TV guide, as this was back in the day where the third page always had a Magic Eye puzzle provided. When the Magic Eye puzzles eventually stopped being printed, the supplement was no longer of any interest to me, as they usually had boring articles about the life stories of various celebrities I knew too little to care about. Once my dad had finished reader the paper, I took to reading it to look at the pictures and look for words I'd not know the meaning of, so I could cross reference them with words in the dictionary. This adventure into the English lexicon would go on for most of my late primary school life.
At my secondary school by the reception, there used to be a small alcove with a wooden seating area where the mail would be dumped for teachers to collect (or students, on behalf of their teachers). Now and again, when I would pick up the register for afternoon registration, there would be leftover morning newspapers in piles, still fresh where some teachers did not have time to pick up the delivery of morning papers. These were usually then moved onto the school library for students to read. There would always be a few papers still left by afternoon registration and I would usually breeze past at around 13:10 to pick up the register before my afternoon period. This is when I started reading The Times, though, that brief experience was short-lived when I found out that Rupert Murdoch owned it. There was a corner shop right by my school and it was there one morning before morning registration that I stood in front of all the newspapers, desperately wanting something of substance to read. I did try The Guardian for a while in Year 8, but soon found it lacked something I wanted. I steered clear of the tabloids, even though the Sun was pretty much one of the regular rags I'd find lurking in the back of most classrooms, and of course the Financial Times was not to my interest. Eventually, I got into reading the Telegraph (that was probably towards the end of Year 8) and for 12-13 years old, I found it presented news to me in a way that wasn't dumbed down, but that wasn't patronising either.
The thing is: I was often criticised for my choice of paper. For starters, a lot of kids thought I was snooty, and the common question that came about was, "What has it got that The Sun hasn't?" For starters, it didn't have pages sporadically splattered with lines or quotes in capital letters for shock factor with regards to issues I couldn't give a toss about. You know – MAN SWALLOWS OWN FINGERS – or something to that effect. There was also the fact that being a broadsheet meant it had the advantage of showing a multitude of photographs in huge print, which I liked, especially if it was a really brilliant and interesting journalistic piece. Then when I got into Sixth Form and we had General Studies and we began to study the political persuasions of the various newspaper reader groups, I was called (apparently 'jokingly') a racist. (Yet nobody seemed to understand why I also read Private Eye, and this further confused matters amongst the gossipers.) A few years and various digs later, I'm still reading the Telegraph. I still get funny looks when I'm reading it on the train or something (small person, huge paper) and I still get the odd comment or two at work (through they joke about me reading the Private Eye too, saying it keeps me 'balanced').
So why Frontline?
It's a long story and a short story in a way. Last month, this book turned up on my doorstep, and on one page, it highlighted the Frontline Club as one of the places to hang out at in London. I'd heard of it mentioned about a year ago, but soon forgot about it. The mention in the le cool guidebook prompted me to look up the club's homepage. The more and more I clicked about, the more and more I found the club's values and interests matched my own. Sick of hearing forever and ever about expenses scandals and the future of Britain's economy, I soon discovered that the club produced an in-house broadsheet. In search of something new to provide some breathing space, I subscribed to the quarterly journal, with no real clue as to what to expect. I did not expect it to replace my current choice of newspaper material (which it won't, being a quarterly), but I would expect it to supplement my needs.
My first copy turned up today. I'm not sure why they gave me two copies (probably to pass on and spread the word), but I'll tell you now that it was 16-pages of pure quality, that's what, with a middle-page spread dedicated to some decent journalistic photography by not the usual names, but names I'd never heard of that had something fresh to contribute. It was like a newspaper version of the Monocle magazine that I read. It's true what they say about quality outdoing quantity, because whilst you can pick up the Evening Standard for free or The Times 'for all you are', I'd sooner pick up something with substance.
frontline: a refreshing broadsheet
I grew up reading newspapers as a child. My dad would always buy the Daily Mail on Saturday and to begin with, I never used to read the newspaper and took more interest in the 'Weekender' supplement/TV guide, as this was back in the day where the third page always had a Magic Eye puzzle provided. When the Magic Eye puzzles eventually stopped being printed, the supplement was no longer of any interest to me, as they usually had boring articles about the life stories of various celebrities I knew too little to care about. Once my dad had finished reader the paper, I took to reading it to look at the pictures and look for words I'd not know the meaning of, so I could cross reference them with words in the dictionary. This adventure into the English lexicon would go on for most of my late primary school life.
At my secondary school by the reception, there used to be a small alcove with a wooden seating area where the mail would be dumped for teachers to collect (or students, on behalf of their teachers). Now and again, when I would pick up the register for afternoon registration, there would be leftover morning newspapers in piles, still fresh where some teachers did not have time to pick up the delivery of morning papers. These were usually then moved onto the school library for students to read. There would always be a few papers still left by afternoon registration and I would usually breeze past at around 13:10 to pick up the register before my afternoon period. This is when I started reading The Times, though, that brief experience was short-lived when I found out that Rupert Murdoch owned it. There was a corner shop right by my school and it was there one morning before morning registration that I stood in front of all the newspapers, desperately wanting something of substance to read. I did try The Guardian for a while in Year 8, but soon found it lacked something I wanted. I steered clear of the tabloids, even though the Sun was pretty much one of the regular rags I'd find lurking in the back of most classrooms, and of course the Financial Times was not to my interest. Eventually, I got into reading the Telegraph (that was probably towards the end of Year 8) and for 12-13 years old, I found it presented news to me in a way that wasn't dumbed down, but that wasn't patronising either.
The thing is: I was often criticised for my choice of paper. For starters, a lot of kids thought I was snooty, and the common question that came about was, "What has it got that The Sun hasn't?" For starters, it didn't have pages sporadically splattered with lines or quotes in capital letters for shock factor with regards to issues I couldn't give a toss about. You know – MAN SWALLOWS OWN FINGERS – or something to that effect. There was also the fact that being a broadsheet meant it had the advantage of showing a multitude of photographs in huge print, which I liked, especially if it was a really brilliant and interesting journalistic piece. Then when I got into Sixth Form and we had General Studies and we began to study the political persuasions of the various newspaper reader groups, I was called (apparently 'jokingly') a racist. (Yet nobody seemed to understand why I also read Private Eye, and this further confused matters amongst the gossipers.) A few years and various digs later, I'm still reading the Telegraph. I still get funny looks when I'm reading it on the train or something (small person, huge paper) and I still get the odd comment or two at work (through they joke about me reading the Private Eye too, saying it keeps me 'balanced').
So why Frontline?
It's a long story and a short story in a way. Last month, this book turned up on my doorstep, and on one page, it highlighted the Frontline Club as one of the places to hang out at in London. I'd heard of it mentioned about a year ago, but soon forgot about it. The mention in the le cool guidebook prompted me to look up the club's homepage. The more and more I clicked about, the more and more I found the club's values and interests matched my own. Sick of hearing forever and ever about expenses scandals and the future of Britain's economy, I soon discovered that the club produced an in-house broadsheet. In search of something new to provide some breathing space, I subscribed to the quarterly journal, with no real clue as to what to expect. I did not expect it to replace my current choice of newspaper material (which it won't, being a quarterly), but I would expect it to supplement my needs.
My first copy turned up today. I'm not sure why they gave me two copies (probably to pass on and spread the word), but I'll tell you now that it was 16-pages of pure quality, that's what, with a middle-page spread dedicated to some decent journalistic photography by not the usual names, but names I'd never heard of that had something fresh to contribute. It was like a newspaper version of the Monocle magazine that I read. It's true what they say about quality outdoing quantity, because whilst you can pick up the Evening Standard for free or The Times 'for all you are', I'd sooner pick up something with substance.