Wallace Arnold: Pity the hard-pressed Snuff Community

Could it really be 40 years since one was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature? Borne up the stairs on the shoulders of John Julius Norwich and Sir Roy Strong, I was inducted by Lady Antonia Fraser and the late Paddy Leigh Fermor, resplendent in their ceremonial robes. Meanwhile, I myself was clad in the society’s prestigious tweed ‘posing pouch’, passed down from generation to generation, unscrubbed.

The Society has long been a sanctuary of civilisation, allowing a wide range of authors, from James Lees-Milne to Debo Devonshire, to mix and mingle in a spirit of inky camaraderie. So imagine my horror upon hearing that the RSL plans to change its 200-year-old rule and let the ‘general public’ pick its Fellows! Goodness knows, I am all for diversity (dread word!). I have the greatest respect for Rishi Sunak, to name but one. Nevertheless, I feel sure that ‘gritty’ northern novelists, ‘rap’ poets and the like would, through no fault of their own, feel ill at ease in the company of such distinguished homegrown scriveners as Andrew Roberts and Annie Glenconner.