Review: Gentlemen, Players and Politicans
| Date | 01 June 1972 |
| Author | J.L. Granatstein |
| DOI | 10.1177/002070207202700224 |
| Published date | 01 June 1972 |
| Subject Matter | Review |
330
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
other
countries
where
the
same
radio
techniques
have
sometimes
(but
not
always)
been
associated
with
different
social
and
cultural
con-
sequences.
Some
issues
converge,
others
diverge,
if the
main
divergence
sometimes
seems
to
be
more
bound
up
with
the
chronology
of
response
rather
than
with
its
content
or
style.
Professor Peers
has
made
an
im-
portant
contribution,
therefore,
to the
still
little
studied
comparative
history
of
broadcasting.
Asa
Briggs/University
of
Sussex
GENTLEMEN,
PLAYERS
AND
POLITICANS
Dalton
Camp
Toronto:
McClelland
&
Stewart,
1970,
346pp,
$io.oo
These
memoirs
by
Dalton
Camp
are
the most
fresh,
frank,
and
funny
by
a
Canadian
politician.
Most
important,
they
add
significantly
to
our
understanding
of
postwar
politics
both
at
Ottawa
and
in the
Maritimes
because
Camp
is
the
first
advertising man-cum-politician
to
set down
on
paper
just
how
he
operated
and
just
how
he
managed
election
cam-
paigns.
Here
is
Camp
plotting
advertising
strategy
in
a
dingy
room
at
the
Lord
Beaverbrook
Hotel in
Fredericton,
writing
mock
editorials
for
the
provincial
press,
signing
them
"L.C.
House"
(short
for "Let's
Clean
House"),
and
gleefully
stirring
up
a
hornet's
nest
with
every
word
that
he writes.
Here
is
Camp
recruiting
people
to
say
awful
things
on
the
radio
about
the Liberal
government
by
reading
the
speeches
he
has
ghosted
for
them.
And here
is
Camp
telling
us
just
what
kind
of
pitch
goes
over best,
valuable
information
for
every
aspiring
politician.
If
at
times
one
gets
the
impression
that
the
image
is
everything
and the
image-creator
stands on
the
right hand
of
God,
that
may
be
understand-
able.
Whether
it
is
true
now,
and
more
particularly
whether
it
was
true
in
the
early
195os,
the
period
about
which
Camp
is
writing,
is
still
arguable.
In
any
case,
the documentation
and
insights
that
Camp
pre-
sents
on
his
election
campaigns
are
most
valuable,
as
are
the
sometimes
devastatingly
frank
comments he
offers
on
the leading
Tories
with
whom
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