Newspapers were the main source of information and this information had to be conveyed in as much detail as possible. People expected it – said tvn24.pl journalist Mariusz Nowik on TVN24. The author of the podcast “In the old news” went back to press releases from over a hundred years ago, in which – as he admitted – the death of Pope Benedict XV was reported “in a rather naturalistic way”.
Pope Emeritus died on Saturday, December 31 last year Benedict XVI. At a similar time almost 101 years earlier, on January 22, 1922, his previous namesake, Pope Benedict XV, passed away.
“In the old news”. Listen on TVN24 GO >>>
Journalist tvn24.pl and TVN24 GO Mariusz Nowik in his podcast “In the old news” went back to press releases from over a century ago, in which the death of the head of the Catholic Church was reported. – These newspapers approached the death of the pope in a completely different way than we would approach now. When Benedict XV was dying, newspapers paid attention to completely different details – Nowik said on Sunday in “Wstasz i weekend”.
“Lublin Land” about the death of Benedict XV
Pre-war press about the death of Benedict XV
– All these newspapers presented the death of the pope in a rather naturalistic way. Pope Benedict XV was dying in what we would say today as limelight. The agencies reported exactly what was happening to the pope. It was written that the pope had shortness of breath, the pope felt bad. It was written exactly who visited the pope, what the pope said. People were very hungry for such information – explained the author of the podcast.
He assessed that “today death is more intimate, especially the death of such great people as popes.” – We don’t get too many details, and here we knew, for example, that Pope Benedict XV refused to take oxygen. He was coughing, feeling unwell, having severe pneumonia after coming down with the flu. This pneumonia was the complication that caused the Pope to die. And this is also what the newspapers wrote about in detail – he reported the content of the newspapers from 101 years ago.
We had no television, we had practically no radio. Newspapers were the main source of information and this information had to be conveyed in as much detail as possible. People expected them. These details were important, the envelope of what was happening around a given event was important. A lot of attention was paid to such details, because they built a picture of the situation that people later talked about in the streets – added Nowik.