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Novel

Scoop

Evelyn Waugh · 1938

Synopsis

Lord Copper, owner of the Daily Beast, wants to cover the civil war threatening Ishmaelia, a republic in East Africa. Mrs Stitch, a society woman, suggests the name of her friend, the novelist John Courteney Boot; but the foreign editor sends for William Boot by mistake, who writes the nature column “Lush Places” from the countryside and believes he is being summoned over an article in which his sister changed the badger into a great crested grebe. Equipped with a mountain of gear, he sets off for Africa.

Context

Its author had covered the Ethiopian war for a London daily, and says in his preface that he had studied the eccentricities of his fellow journalists with delight. He missed the big story of the war, an oil concession granted by the emperor, while he was at Harar; his paper cabled him to return to the capital as quickly as possible, and dismissed him a few months later. Two fellow journalists serve as models for two characters, and Addis Ababa becomes Jacksonburg. He then wrote to a friend that he was a very bad journalist, and that only a swine could succeed in that kind of assignment.

Who it is for

A short satirical novel, with comedy arising from situations; the French translation in use is available in paperback.

Prizes and reception

The first French title was “Sensation !”, in 1946; Henri Evans's translation, in 1980, returned to the original title.

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