Writers must tell the truth, not spare us pain

THE RESUSCITATION of the Mary Bell case tells us much about the people we have become, the papers we read and the government we elected a year ago. I begin with the people, who behaved entirely reasonably. They objected when Ms Bell's house on the south coast was besieged by Fleet Street's finest; when Ms Bell and her 14-year-old daughter had to take refuge elsewhere as a consequence; and, most of all, when her daughter was then told for the first time about her mother's crimes. She had to be told solely because of the behaviour of the newspapers.

The papers would almost certainly have behaved as they did anyway. They did not need the support of Mr Jack Straw and Mr Tony Blair. But these ministers clearly did not act as a restraining influence: if anything, the reverse.

Mr Blair said - during some electronic stunt rather than in the Commons - that the payment made to Ms Bell by the author of the book about her, Ms Gitta Sereny, was "inherently repugnant". Mr Straw went rather further, saying that, by co-operating with Ms Sereny, Ms Bell had forfeited any right to privacy which she might previously have possessed. Indeed, Mr Straw came perilously close to suggesting that, owing to her complaisant attitude, Ms Bell had somehow removed herself from the protection of the law, such as it was. It was now open season on Ms Bell: that was what the Home Secretary appeared to be saying. Henceforward her only course was to throw herself on the mercy of a People's Tribunal presided over by Lords Hollick and Rothermere, Mr David Montgomery and Mr Rupert Murdoch.

The writers in the broadsheet press do not go quite so far as this. However, they blame Ms Sereny not only for giving Ms Bell money (which is indeed a separate issue) but for writing about her at all. She should, they say, have preserved a prudent silence - refrained from disturbing old tombstones and allowing the plague-germs to escape.

For, first, any increase in knowledge gained as a result of Ms Sereny's diligence and Ms Bell's disclo- sures would not justify the pain caused to innocent survivors of the terrible events of 30 years ago. And, second, any research that had to be done should properly be undertaken by psychiatrists or what-have-you employed by the state (though in these privatised times you can never be quite sure who does or does not work for the government).

Both these arguments are feeble. The second is the feebler, so I shall deal with it first. There are thousands of official reports of political crises of one sort or another, from the Marconi scandal and the Tonypandy riots to the D-Notice affair and the Londonderry killings. I have read scores of them. Some reports are valuable historical records; others are interesting more for what they suppress than for what they reveal; most are in between. Many of these reports have formed the basis of good books.

Some crises have produced no reports. Books have none the less followed. It has never been suggested that they should not have been written. Scandalously, no psychiatric work was done on Ms Bell. Even if it had, that would not have precluded Ms Sereny from writing a book of her own.

The argument that no author should ever risk causing distress or pain is one that comes naturally to those who have no understanding of writing, who hate books or who, at any rate, believe that no one ever writes anything except for money. I blame Dr Johnson: "No man but a blockhead ever wrote except for money." Yet most writers would make more by writing two or three articles for a colour magazine than by producing a whole book.

It is not the function of the writer to have regard for other people's feelings but to tell the truth. If he or she can manage to do so entertainingly, so much the better. If numerous people can be persuaded to buy the work in question, better still. Some proper writers, such as Nick Hornby or my friend Robert Harris, go on to make lots of money. But money, agreeable though it is to possess, and flattering though it may be to make, is rarely the primary motive.

There is no question but that Ms Sereny is what I call a proper writer. The extraordinary thing about the last week is that neither the television news nor the newspapers (not even the Times, which is serialising her book) have given a true indication of her eminence in the trade.

She is not, I confess, my cup of tea. It is not so much that I can take her or leave her: rather that I give a respectful nod and pass briskly on my way. My appetite for reading about Nazis, child-killers or both is limited, non-existent really. Moreover, I do not think Ms Sereny is sound doctrinally. A few years ago she said she did not think there was any such thing as an evil child. A better guide is Psalms 51. 5: "Behold, I was shapen in wickedness: and in sin hath my mother conceived me."

Curiously, Ms Sereny is more in accord with the sloppy spirit of the times than the psalmist was. And yet, it is she who is being reviled, a respectable lady of 74 who has nevertheless seen life and whose industry is a model to us all. It is very odd. As Macaulay might have written: "We know no spectacle so ridiculous as the British press in one of its periodical fits of morality." Yet the morals here are perfectly straightforward. Ms Sereny was fully entitled to write her book. Indeed, she is to be commended for writing it. What others choose to make of it is for them. And the Times did nothing wrong in serialising it in the normal course of newspaper business.

The only doubt is whether Ms Sereny was right to pay Ms Bell for her co-operation. This was the point on to which Mr Blair latched. He indicated that something - he was not sure precisely what, but something - had to be done. As the late Stanley Holloway related of Albert and the Lion, someone had got to be summonsed. It would, presumably, have to be Ms Bell, Ms Sereny or both: for Messrs Macmillan, the publishers of the book, had not contributed anything to Ms Bell.

This was to me one of the surprising aspects of the affair. I have never paid for information in my life, except by buying books for myself or drinks for politicians. But, if I were to fork out cash, I should expect it to be supplied by my publishers rather than by me.

Anyway, the Attorney-General, Mr John Morris, was photographed on television news gravely going through papers in what was manifestly a set-up picture. The nearest case is that of Mr George Blake, whose Moscow-bound royalties from Messrs Jonathan Cape were stopped by the Court of Appeal last December. The court said that it was an "exceptional case" in which the Attorney was entitled to intervene "to uphold the principle that a criminal does not retain profit directly derived from the commission of his crime".

Whether the payment to Ms Bell comes within this principle is a matter of learned argument. Mr Frank ("Mad Frankie") Frazer makes what I can only assume must be a handsome living from his numerous past iniquities. Mr Nick Leeson will almost certainly prosper likewise when he is in a position to do so. I do not really see why Ms Bell should be regarded more harshly. Mr Attorney agrees. Perhaps what tells us most about ourselves today is that in 1972 Ms Sereny published a book on exactly the same subject. And there was no fuss at all.