Emacs-File-stamp: "/home/ysverdlov/leninist.biz/en/1967/LOL318/20061230/099.tx" Emacs-Time-stamp: "2010-01-18 17:27:20" __EMAIL__ webmaster@leninist.biz __OCR__ ABBYY 6 Professional (2006.03.0) __WHERE_PAGE_NUMBERS__ bottom __FOOTNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [*]+ __ENDNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+ [BEGIN] &progress; [1] photo [2] __AUTHOR__ X __TITLE__ LENIN IN OUR LIFE __TEXTFILE_BORN__ 2006-12-30T21:14:43-0800 __TRANSMARKUP__ "R. Cymbala" 099-1.jpg 099-2.jpg 099-3.jpg __PUBL__ Progress Publishers Moscow 1967 [3] Translated from the Russian by T. Kapustin Edited by Y. S d o b n i k o v J1EHHH B HAUJEH >KH3HH Ha QHSJIUIICKOM nSblKS __COPYRIGHT__ First printing 1967 I'rinli'tl in tin' Union of Sonii'l Socialist [4] CONTENTS About the Book.................. 7 Lydia Zhak. Gorky................ 11 Boris Kostyukovsky. Renewal............ 33 Nikolai Strokovsky. The Pen as a Bayonet....... 55 Alexei Musatov, Mikhail Lyashenko. A Meeting Thai Never Took Place................... 85 Victor Sytin. The Visionary from Kaluga....... 107 Alexander Deich. Lunacharsky............ 125 Galina Bashkirova. The Right Stand.......... 147 Zakhar Dicharov. A Life Story............ 161 Ustas Paleckis. The Most Important Thing in Life .... 179 Marietta Shaginyan. A Lesson from Lenin....... 195 Alexander Belov. A Lesson for Life.......... 221 Berdy Kerbabayev. Dreams Come True........ 243 Sergei Konenkov. Guiding Star............ 257 Nikolai Zhukov. A Great Theme........... 271 Wanda Beletskaya. Unfinished Poem.......... 287 Yevgeny Ryabchikov. The Central Cosmodrome..... 307 5 ~ [6] __ALPHA_LVL1__ ABOUT THE BOOK

The reader need not be surprised that among the men and women whose reminiscences are collected in the present volume he will find not only old and tried Bolsheviks and Lenin's trusted comrades-in-arms, but also those who may never have had a chance of meeting or speaking with Lenin. The great force of Lenin's ideas lies precisely in their ability to inspire the minds and fire the souls of those who joined the revolutionary struggle in the full consciousness of what they were doing, and also those who seemed, at first glance, to have little to do with the revolution. Lenin was always ready to meet them half-way. He stretched out a hand of welcome to anyone who worked honestly and fruitfully in the interests of the people, and helped them see the right road during the years of the country's revolutionary transformation.

Lenin's interest and concern for people were revealed in a variety of ways. He made friends and maintained personal contacts, and he kept up a correspondence with workers, peasants, writers, scientists, architects, etc. He was ready to offer material aid to those in need. He was keenly interested in people's lives, aspirations and endeavours; and his approach to each had a touch peculiarly his own, be it a famous writer, a young inventor, a wise old gardener, or a bold dreamer dreaming of interstellar flight, which seemed, in those days, nothing short of fantastic.

The reader will find ample confirmation of all this in the present collection of stories. And he will find in them something else, no less valuable; for they tell of the response which Lenin's tactful concern drew from many Russian scientists, artists, workers and inventors who laboured unstintingly so that the young Soviet Republic might grow strong and prosperous.

7 GORKY [8] 099-4.jpg [9]

Lenin, October 1920

[10] __ALPHA_LVL1__ GORKY

For Gorky Lenin had a particular affection, such as few other men had merited.

M. I. Vlyanova

Gorky's love for Lenin was deep and impetuous, and his admiration, passionate.

M. F. Andreyeva

Some themes are so vast that it takes more than one writer, artist or scientist to encompass them. Lenin and Gorky fall in that class, for it will require a great collective effort, by many minds and hearts, to tell the full story of their lives one day.

What we do have is thumb-nail portraits, snatches of biography and glimpses of the untiring selfless effort and courageous struggle of two men who were deeply devoted to each other and who had a profound awareness of each other's part in transforming this life.

Let the documents tell how Gorky was drawn to Lenin, and how an abiding friendship developed between the great leader of the socialist revolution and its bard, who himself did so much for its cause.

At the turn of the century, Gorky was a writer of world renown. Not only did he stand up in defence of man oppressed in capitalist society, and expose the anti-humanism and false morality of capitalism, but he demonstrated in his brilliant literary images that in terms of history the bourgeoisie was bankrupt and had no valid claim to lasting domination. He sang the inevitable revolution and extolled heroic exploits to secure its victory.

Lenin's younger sister, Maria Ilyinichna, wrote in her reminiscences: ``I recall the hard years when the Party had to work underground, and the great impact of Gorky's 11 works on the young people of the day who were deprived of the freedom of speech. We all read and reread his Mother and committed to memory his Song of the Stormy Petrel.

Lenin and Gorky first met in 1905 but long before that their articles were frequently published in the same progressive journals, and their names were linked together in the hearts and minds of revolutionary young Marxists who looked to them for guidance.

Gorky first heard of Lenin (Ulyanov) in Samara in the spring of 1896. By then Lenin was a faithful reader of the rapidly maturing writer and was greatly interested not only in his creative work but also in his personality and social stand.

Gorky was connected with the underground SocialDemocratic movement from the very start of his literary career. He was arrested on April 17, 1901, on a charge of spreading anti-government propaganda among the workers of Sormovo.

Progressive people in Russia mounted a campaign in defence of Gorky. He suffered from tuberculosis and soon was released from prison but was exiled to Arzamas where he lived under police surveillance. With great difficulty he finally managed to obtain permission to go to the Crimea for treatment. Gorky's departure from Nizhny Novgorod sparked off a mass demonstration by the local revolutionary-minded youth. In his article, entitled `` Demonstrations Have Begun'', which he wrote in this connection, Lenin attached national significance to the demonstration and for the first time mentioned Gorky's name in print, hailing his deeds and talent. ``On November 7, a small but successful demonstration was held in Nizhny Novgorod, which arose out of a farewell gathering in honour of Maxim Gorky. An author of European fame, whose only weapon was free speech (as a speaker at the Nizhny Novgorod demonstration aptly put it), was being banished by the autocratic government from his home town without trial or investigation. The bashi-bazouks accuse him of 12 exercising a harmful influence on us, said the speaker in the name of all Russians in whom but a spark of striving towards light and liberty is alive, but we declare that his influence has been a good one.''

099-5.jpg

M. Gorky

Thus, at the turn of the twentieth century, Lenin saw Gorky as a writer and public figure who was destined to cast in his lot with the cause of the Russian working class and its vanguard, the Party.

By October 1902 Gorky had established connections with Lenin's newspaper Iskra, and expressed readiness to cooperate in every way. Lenin was informed of this by Natasha Kozhevnikova, the paper's Moscow agent, who wrote to him: ``Our comrade has probably informed you that we have had a talk with Gorky----The meeting was almost official, but I was greatly delighted to learn that all his sympathies are with us___He finds our paper to be the only one which is of interest, which shows talent and commands respect. He considers our organisation to be the strongest and most solid.''

Gorky helped Iskra, and after the split within the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party (R.S.D.L.P.) sided with the Bolsheviks. While it may appear no personal relations between Gorky and Lenin had yet been established ---after all, they had neither met nor written to each other---actually these relations already existed and were growing stronger. Contact with Gorky in Russia was maintained through Party workers.

In November 1904, R. S. Zemlyachka wrote to Lenin 13 that she had spoken with Gorky and briefed him on the differences in the Party. Gorky had expressed his full support for the majority, she wrote. ``Down with the generals,'' he had said, and advocated calling a congress; he offered to help in publishing a paper. A subsequent letter to Geneva said: ``He is ready to give 3,000 rubles to cover the cost of publication at once, and promised to give more and more if he finds that the organ spurns trivial polemics.'' That same day Gorky gave Bogdanov his first cheque of 700 rubles to forward it to Lenin in Geneva specially for publishing the Bolshevik paper Vperyod. By his active participation in Bolshevik Party work, Gorky helped to implement Lenin's ideas, although he was not a cardcarrying member of the Party and had not yet met Lenin in person.

R. S. Zemlyachka wrote to Krupskaya and Lenin: ``I have recently had long talks with the writer who had sent us the funds. He is now completely on our side and is very much concerned about our welfare. . . . He told me that he regards the Old Man (Lenin) as the only real political leader and I am trying to take advantage of this disposition. I think the Old Man should write to him personally so as to back up his mood with man-to-man correspondence.''

But this, unfortunately, did not materialise. Gorky was soon arrested in Riga for writing his appeal ``To Russian Society'', following the mass shooting of workers in St. Petersburg on January 9, 1905, of which he himself was an eye witness. Lenin was informed of this by Maxim Litvinov, who wrote to him en route from Riga to St. Petersburg: ``Unless I am mistaken, the gendarmes are hauling Gorky to St. Petersburg in the same coach with me. He had returned from there only yesterday morning.''

The revolution was maturing and no amount of repression could stem the tide of popular indignation.

On January 11, 1905, the German paper Vossiche Zeitung published an item which said that Gorky's arrest in Riga 14 had sparked off student disturbances. Lenin took note of these lines and on January 25 the paper Vperyod carried his article, entitled ``Trepov Plays the Master'', in which Lenin assessed the arrest of Gorky and others primarily as a political act testifying to tsarism's cowardice, confusion and frenzy.

With the atmosphere in Russia white hot because of the 1905 revolution, the R.S.D.L.P. held its Third Congress abroad to work out the tactics of the revolution. Even in this turbulent period, Lenin remembered Gorky and was anxious to know what he thought of the events. On the eve of the Congress, Lenin showered Stroyev (V. A. Desnitsky), the Nizhny Novgorod delegate, with questions about Gorky: "What is he doing now? What is his attitude to the Party? Is he taking part in the literary activity of local organisations?" Having heard the answer, Lenin remarked, "This is fine! It is very good that Gorky is with us. He is a real revolutionary writer of great talent---he detests intellectual slobbery, he refuses to whimper, and this is good!''

``You realise, of course,'' Lenin drove home his point, "how important it is that a truly great writer is coming--- has come---to us and the working class to defend the cause of the revolution.''

Lenin saw Gorky chiefly as an artist close to the proletariat, a writer contributing his talent to its cause, and he sought to preserve this talent.

In 1905 Gorky was released on bail from prison pending his trial, and immersed himself in the cause of the revolution. He became its active participant. He sought ways of raising funds for the Party, and played an active role in organising the first legal Bolshevik paper, Novaya Zhizn, which was subsequently edited by Lenin after his return to Russia.

By then Gorky was in the thick of the revolutionary events in Moscow, and joined the Party.

15

His first meeting with Lenin took place on November 27, 1905, in the editorial office of Novaya Zhizn.

Gorky had corne from Moscow to attend a special conference. In his memoirs, V. A. Desnitsky describes Gorky's report on the mood of the Moscow workers: "Gorky spoke at length about the events and the mood of the people in Moscow, Bauman's funeral, the reactionary gangs, the arming of workers and students, and the attitude of intellectuals, giving a graphic description of street scenes. Lenin listened to his account with profound interest. As usual, he was anxious to get at the concrete facts, the minute details and words which conveyed a fresh and direct impression of actual reality. It was his first experience of Gorky as a raconteur and he at once realised the tremendous importance of his observations of and conclusions about men and events.''

After their meeting in St. Petersburg, Lenin and Gorky worked even closer together. Their names appeared ever more frequently side by side in the same pro-Bolshevik papers and journals.

The various themes that Gorky conceived in 1905 and 1906 for his articles and works of fiction sprang from his personal experience, observations and thinking and were nearly always in the same stream as those dealt with by Lenin and the Bolshevik press.

Lenin welcomed Gorky's "Notes on the Petty-- Bourgeoisie'', published in Novaya Zhizn. When this was viciously attacked by N. Berdyaev, a reactionary Cadet publicist, Lenin ridiculed him in his article, "The Victory of the Cadets and the Tasks of the Workers' Party".

Gorky realised that the defeat of the 1905 armed uprising was but a temporary setback. In his article, "The Case of Nikolai Schmidt'', he wrote: "The revolution is not--- and will not be---crushed.

``Sometimes a flame must cover itself up in smoke to hide its terrible face, but it does this not to die down, but 16 merely to collect all its strength and leap out afresh, to envelop and incinerate everything.''

Gorky expressed the same idea in his play The Enemies and in his novel Mother. In the play, the actress Tatyana Lugovaya, seeing the heroic behaviour of the workers after their defeat, is filled with the conviction "that these men will win''. In the novel, the mother has suffered a great deal but remains indomitable. "Reason cannot be drowned in blood,'' she hurls into the faces of the gendarmes beating her up.

All of Gorky's writings and appeals helped Lenin and the Bolsheviks to carry on the revolutionary struggle. That is why it was natural for Lenin to turn to Gorky's images in his article, "Before the Storm'', published in Proletary on August 21, 1906. He wrote: ".. . the proletariat is preparing for the struggle; it is unitedly and boldly marching to meet the storm, eager to plunge into the thick of the fight. We have had enough of the hegemony of the cowardly Cadets, those 'stupid penguins' who 'timidly hide their fat bodies behind the rocks'.

``Let the storm rage louder!''

__*_*_*__

Gorky was given a Party assignment to go to America via Europe and tell the truth about the Russian revolution, so as to prevent the tsarist government from obtaining a loan, and to raise the necessary funds for Party work.

Shortly before his departure for Helsingfors, Gorky met Lenin. N. Y. Burenin, who accompanied Gorky, wrote: "Lenin attached great importance to the trip.'' We may assume, therefore, that he gave Gorky some personal instructions and wished him bon voyage.

Gorky launched a campaign in the European press against the granting of any loan to the tsarist government. In France, l'Humanit\'e carried his article entitled, "Don't give any money to the Russian Government''. Another of __PRINTERS_P_17_COMMENT__ 2---2330 17 his articles published in Britain by The Nation condemned any possible British aid to tsarism. It said, in part: "There are two Russias---with which one of the two do you intend to conclude an alliance? One of them is the Russia of the Emperor Nicholas, the bureaucracy and the 'union of the Russian people' . . . the other Russia is the Russia of 100 million Slavs and about 50 million people of various other nationalities constituting the Russian Empire. This entire mass of people, to a man, hate the tsar and all those who are with him and for him. Which then of the two Russias do you consider to be the real one, capable of sustaining itself and working towards creating a civilisation that you cherish and value?''

Gorky urged the French and British proletariat to protest against their governments' granting any loans to Nicholas II for suppressing those who were their brothers by class.

France, nevertheless, granted tsarist Russia a loan. But Gorky did not give up. He published a wrathful pamphlet, entitled "La Belle France'', and followed it up a little later with "An Open Letter to Monsieur Olar" in which he expressed his firm conviction "that the Russian people will never repay to the French bankers the loans for which they have already paid in blood".

The works Gorky wrote in America, primarily his novel Mother and his play The Enemies, were a big help to the Bolsheviks in combating the Menshevik appraisals of the lessons of the 1905 revolution in Russia.

Before their departure for London, Gorky and Lenin met again in Berlin. This and their trip together made them very close friends.

In Berlin, they spent most of their time together, going to theatres, promenading and having long discussions. They met K. Kautsky and R. Luxemburg, together. It was there that Lenin was given the manuscript of Gorky's Mother.

Gorky's first two meetings with Lenin were purely on 18 business, but their meeting in Berlin gave him an opportunity of getting to know Lenin the man. Later on, in the tense atmosphere of the Congress in London he watched him as leader. Gorky observed how Lenin spoke with the worker delegates, and noticed their unbounded admiration of him. With his every fibre, he felt the powerful bonds linking Lenin with the people, with all of Russia's progressive proletarians.

Gorky realised that Lenin was a new type of leader.

And although his friendship with Lenin thereafter continued to be one "of equals'', Gorky himself admitted that from then on Lenin became for him "the gentle friend and strict teacher" who exercised a tremendous personal influence on him.

There are ample grounds to assert that after the London Congress, Gorky's activity as a representative of the progressive, proletarian culture was influenced mainly by Lenin. This was so despite Gorky's intimacy with the bogostroiteli^^*^^ in 1908 and 1909 and his serious political mistakes in 1917 and 1918.

Lenin never tried to curry favour with his friend by glossing over his mistakes. He did not ``forgive'' him, but explained the essence of his erroneous views. He was not afraid to do that because he was sure that Gorky, the great herald of the proletarian revolution (its Stormy Petrel, as one of his stories is called), would never abandon it.

Lenin's letters to Gorky are very instructive in this respect. Gorky was above all a writer, emotional and highly inflammable. Lenin never forgot that Gorky viewed the world as an artist, and he always made a point of explaining to him at length the political essence of various social phenomena.

_-_-_

^^*^^ Bogostroiteli (god-builders)---a religious philosophical trend, hostile to Marxism, that emerged after the defeat of the 1905--07 revolution in Russia. They advocated the establishment of a new ``socialist'' religion and tried to reconcile Marxism and religion.

19

On November~16, 1909, Lenin wrote to Gorky from Paris:

``I gathered from Mikhail that you are taking things hard, dear A. M. You are seeing the working-class and Social-Democratic movement from an aspect and in forms and manifestations which already more than once in the history of Russia and Western Europe have led intellectuals of little faith to despair of the workers' movement and Social-Democracy. I am confident that this will not happen in your case, and after my talk with Mikhail I want to shake your hand heartily.

``With your gifts as an artist you have rendered such a tremendous service to the working-class movement of Russia and indeed not only of Russia---and will render a still greater service yet, that it is on no account permissible for you to fall a prey to moods of depression evoked by episodes of the struggle abroad.''

The bourgeois press spread rumours that Gorky had broken with the Bolsheviks. Lenin retaliated with a biting article, entitled "The Bourgeois Press's Fable about Gorky's Expulsion'', which read in part: "The bourgeois parties would like Gorky to leave the Social-Democratic Party. . . . Their labour is in vain. Comrade Gorky by his great works of art has bound himself too closely to the workers' movement in Russia and throughout the world to reply with anything but contempt.''

Lenin wrote these lines when he already knew not only of Gorky's sympathy for the bogostroiteli but also of the fact that it had been described in the story Confession, which Lenin censured. He did so because he deeply believed that this story was only a temporary deviation in the life of the great writer from the straight path of proletarian art, which Gorky had followed so consistently until then. Lenin's reminder to Gorky of what his writing meant to the working class of Russia and the whole world was also part of the effort to get him back on the right path.

Plekhanov, on the other hand, took advantage of Gorky's delusions and played up his story in order to separate him 20 from Marxism. In his article, entitled "Religious Strivings' in Russia" he tried hard to prove that the fallacies in The Confession were not accidental and could be traced to their source in the novel Mother. That being the case, he argued, it followed that Gorky failed to understand Marxism and socialism, and would never understand them.

Plekhanov had tried to discount Gorky as a writer of the proletariat, while Lenin expressed his faith in Gorky and said that he would still "do so much good" to the working class of Russia and the whole world. And Lenin was right.

At another and far more decisive moment of Russian history in 1917 and 1918, fresh disputes flared up over Gorky---with various and conflicting attitudes towards him---within the ranks of the Communist Party, the two extremes of which were expressed by the articles of Lenin and of Stalin. By his subsequent activity and creative work Gorky justified Lenin's hopes and disproved the prediction made by Stalin, who himself later radically changed his views about Gorky and gave the great proletarian writer his due.

What was it that had happened to Gorky in the early Soviet years?

In his recollections of Lenin, in his own articles, letters and talks, Gorky very frankly and honestly spoke of his errors in 1917 and 1918 and of his relations with Lenin in that period. He wrote: "My relations with Lenin in 1917 and 1918 left much to be desired, but they could not have been otherwise.

``When Lenin returned to Russia in 1917 and published his 'theses', I thought that with these theses he risked sacrificing to the Russian peasantry the whole numerically insignificant but heroic body of politically-trained workers and the sincere revolutionary intelligentsia and that this active force, the only revolutionary one then in Russia, would be tossed, like a pinch of salt, into the vast freshwater swamp of the peasantry---only to dissolve in it 21 without a trace, without altering anything at all in the life, spirit and history of the Russian people.''

Gorky erred, and erred gravely, when he backed up his views on the pages of the semi-Menshevik newspaper Novaya Zhizn, and many feared that he had lost his bearings, that he had done with the revolution and was gone.

But even then, for all the gravity of his errors, Gorky did not set himself apart from the revolutionary people and their lot. Nor did the people deny the writer: together with Lenin, they worked to bring him back.

It cannot be said that Lenin ever ``forgave'' Gorky. For when he exposed the Novaya Zhizn stand, laying bare its objective meaning, he also exposed the objective content of Gorky's articles in that paper. Thus, the following of Lenin's words about the paper likewise applied to Gorky's articles:

``If Novaya Zhizn, therefore, is afraid of the proletarian dictatorship and rejects it because, as it claims, the proletarian power may be defeated by the bourgeoisie, it is tantamount to its surreptitiously reverting to the position of compromise with the capitalists! It is as clear as daylight, that whoever is afraid of resistance, whoever does not believe that it is possible to break this resistance, whoever warns the people: 'beware of the resistance of the capitalists, you will not be able to cope with it', is thereby again calling for compromise with the capitalists.''

But even when Lenin saw Gorky's mistakes, he had no doubt at all that Gorky was "an enormous artistic talent, who has been, and will be of great benefit to the world proletarian movement''. Consequently, he would come to understand his mistakes and would return to march in step with the Party.

It was in this period that a group of Bolsheviks in St. Petersburg, members of the Vyborg District Soviet of Workers' Deputies, had a talk with Lenin, and one of them asked, "Is it really true that Gorky has left us for 22 good?" Lenin answered confidently, "No, Gorky cannot really leave us. It is all a passing phase, an alien wind, and he will definitely be with us.''

Once again Lenin won in the struggle for Gorky. V. A. Desnitsky, who knew both Lenin and Gorky closely, wrote: "Lenin's attitude towards Gorky's 'errors' only looks like 'condescension' and 'leniency'. Actually, it is a form and a phase of a political leader's tense struggle for a great writer, whose loss would be a grave misfortune to the proletariat.''

Lenin's tactics proved to be correct: Gorky returned to Lenin. He rolled up his sleeves and went on to help the Party build socialist culture.

Lenin knew Gorky's strong points and weak ones. He knew that in politics Gorky sometimes displayed "utter spinelessness'', but that in his writing he was wise and as an organiser of workers in culture, excellent. Lenin, therefore, never tried to turn him into a political functionary but always strove to have him take up such assignments of the Party, and later of the Soviet Government, in which his services were invaluable.

Long before the revolution, Lenin welcomed Lunacharsky's proposal to have Gorky edit the literary criticism in Proletary, and asked Gorky to write something for early issues of the paper, invited him to contribute to Zvezda, Pravda, and Prosveshcheniye, write something about Lev Tolstoi, etc. Lenin praised Gorky's Italian Tales and discussed with him plans for the publication of collections and other publishing business. Gorky was always very responsive to all of Lenin's suggestions, and took an active part both as author and editor in various Bolshevik papers and journals, mustering the literary talent of the then young proletarian literature.

Lenin always regarded Gorky as an authority in the field of art. Gorky, for his part, always paid great heed to Lenin's views of literature, particularly his opinion of Gorky's own works and literary plans.

23

When the two men were on Capri, Gorky told Lenin of the theme of a new novel about the life of three generations in a bourgeois family. Lenin, having heard him out, expressed approval, but added there and then that a book of that sort should be written after the revolution, for life itself had not yet provided the material for an ending. Gorky must have taken heed of this advice, and The Artamonovs (the novel in question) was written only when life itself had prompted an appropriate ending.

In the early years after the revolution, Gorky was so engrossed in the everyday affairs of the young Soviet Republic, that he seemed to find no time at all to write. But he did write---with deep, mature and pent-up feeling. In 1918--19, he published his memoir essays about the writers Korolenko, Tolstoi and Andreyev. Many readers then wondered if that was not a sign of retreat, of an attempt by Gorky to escape from reality by seeking seclusion in the past. Their apprehensions, however, proved unfounded.

Gorky's recollections of his fellow writers were not only history or finely wrought portraits of great writers whom he knew and loved. These portraits are an expression of Gorky's own outlook, his own militant position, which was close to that of Lenin and the Bolsheviks.

In those years, Lenin is known to have urged a critical reappraisal of the cultural heritage of the past. He explained to young people that if they were to become the builders of a new, communist society, they had to assimilate all the values created by age-old human culture. Lenin fought against the pseudo-``proletarian'' and nihilistic attitude towards all cultural heritage.

In his essay on Leonid Andreyev, Gorky revealed the tragedy of a talented writer who had refused to join the revolutionary struggle of his own people and had broken away from them. It was much more than just the writer's personal recollections of Leonid Andreyev and a portrayal of the fate of an individual. It was a discussion of the 24 relationship of the intelligentsia and the people, the intelligentsia and the revolution---a burning and most topical theme at the time.

From 1908 to 1911 Lenin wrote several articles about Lev Tolstoi. The first of these, entitled Lev Tolstoi as a Mirror of the Russian Revolution, revealed Tolstoi in a completely new light. Lenin wrote of the crying contradictions in Tolstoi's views and works, pointing out what was of permanent value in the great writer's heritage and what was outdated and rejected by Russia's historical development. Gorky's reminiscences of Tolstoi appeared in 1919. It would be naive to look for illustrations here to all the points raised by Lenin in his article on Tolstoi just mentioned. But in sentiment and ideology Gorky's essay on Tolstoi echoes Lenin's earlier analysis of the great writer's works. Here is the view of A. V. Lunacharsky, a contemporary and an authority: 'iGorky, through his excellent analysis of Tolstoi---brought out in the form of vivid recollections and sympathetic comments---presents an original sociological interpretation of Tolstoi. It is close to Lenin's analysis.''

``What a rock, eh? What a giant of humanity!" said Lenin. "That, my friend, is an artist.. .. And---do you know what else amazes me? There was no real muzhik in literature before that Count came along.''

Lenin's words denoted both his high esteem of Tolstoi's great talent, and full agreement with Gorky's portrayal of him. B. F. Malkin recounts: "When Gorky's book on his recollections of Tolstoi was published we immediately sent Lenin a copy. He later told us that that night he had read the book right through at one gulp and enjoyed it tremendously. 'You know,' he said, sharing his impressions with us, 'Gorky's image of Tolstoi is as vivid as though he were alive. I doubt if anyone has ever written so truthfully and boldly about him.'"

Such was Lenin's heartfelt response to Gorky's recollections of Tolstoi, which were his in spirit.

25

After the revolution, Gorky was fully absorbed with the building of Soviet culture. He did much for the intellectuals and helped the Soviet power to win them over to its side.

Gorky worked with Lenin in the cultural field and was his most valued assistant.

But there were times when Gorky was beset by doubts and was in the grip of pessimistic moods, and in these moments of depression he either wrote to Lenin or went from Petersburg to Moscow to see him and have long talks with him.

Lenin helped Gorky to overcome these melancholic moods, and regain his faith. In one of his letters to Gorky in 1919 Lenin explained that he found not a shadow of an indication of a divergence in politics or in ideas. Lenin knew that Gorky's malaise was due to his inner emotional strife resulting from the fact "that he had artificially placed himself in a state of constant suspense---that while the new life had not as yet manifested itself in the huge capital, he saw that bourgeois decadence there prevailed".

Lenin sought in many ways to bring Gorky into closer contact with everyday life. He tried to convince him that the upshoots of the new life---and consequently, the deductions to be made therefrom---can "best be observed at the grass roots. . .".

The call repeatedly heard in Lenin's letters to Gorky over a long period---from 1908 and 1909, through 1913, and during the early years of the revolution---was to keep in touch with life. On March 6, 1913, for example, Lenin advised Gorky to take advantage of the literary amnesty and to return to Russia. Lenin's motive was "that for a revolutionary writer to have the possibility of roaming around Russia (the new Russia) meant that he would afterwards be able to hit a hundred times harder at the Romanovs and Co.".

It is impossible in a short essay to describe all of Gorky's manifold activities in the first years of the revolution in 26 which he always had Lenin's support. We can at best therefore convey only the atmosphere of friendship that existed between the great leader and the writer.

M. I. Glyasser wrote: "There was an atmosphere of great joy in the secretariat in those days whenever Gorky came to visit Lenin. This joy seemed to spring for us from Lenin's elation, from his eager anticipation to see Gorky, for whom he had such obvious and great affection, an intimate friend who had devoted all his great talent to serve the cause of the proletarian revolution.

``During these hours when Gorky was our guest we always had a very busy time, for he would come to Lenin with a whole lot of cares about people and problems, and Lenin would listen to him attentively and carefully examine every question. We were then immediately given instructions, and made the necessary inquiries, wrote letters, dispatched telegrams and urgently reported the results to Lenin.

``Sometimes on Lenin's instructions, just after a talk with Gorky, I would discuss various matters with Gorky in detail and take note of his requests. Gorky could not conceal his excitement after his talks with Lenin; he often shared his impressions and lived them all over again.. ..''

In November 1921, on Lenin's insistence, the ailing Gorky went abroad to recuperate. They corresponded directly and through third parties. Lenin looked after Gorky's affairs and promoted the publication of his collected works. He attached great importance to Gorky's contacts abroad with progressive figures in European culture.

Then Lenin became gravely ill. Shortly before his death, he thought of Gorky, asked about him and wanted something read from his works. It is not surprising, therefore, that Gorky was among the first to whom N. K. Krupskaya wrote after Lenin's death.

``Dear Alexei Maximovich,'' she wrote, "yesterday we buried Vladimir Ilyich.

27

``Until his very last hour, he remained as you had always known him---a man of tremendous will-power and selfcontrol, who showed such tender concern for others, who laughed and joked even on the very eve of his death. ...

``Every day we would read the paper and carry on a discussion.

``Once when he came across a report in the paper saying that you were ill, he became highly alarmed and kept asking worriedly, 'How is he? What news is there?'

``In the evenings I would read him books which he himself selected from the parcels arriving from the city. He first asked me to read him your book about Korolenko and then My Universities."

Thus, Gorky was a companion of Lenin's till his very last day.

For Gorky, Lenin was the guiding light in the whole of his life's work.

Lydia Zhak

[28] ~ [29]

RENEWAL

[30] 099-6.jpg [31]

Lenin, November 1921

[32] __ALPHA_LVL1__ Renewal

Soon after the transfer of the Soviet Government from Petrograd to Moscow in 1918, Lenin asked Zholtovsky, the architect, to come and see him.

Ivan Zholtovsky took from his side-pocket a thick folded sheet of paper and as he reread it he thought again of the fact that Lenin had indicated not only the hour of the appointment and the address---the former City Duma---but even the floor and the room number, to help Zholtovsky save time in finding his way.

He wondered what the head of the Soviet Government wanted to see him about. Was it really new construction--- and this at a time when the Soviet State was confronted by a host of outstanding problems, when it was hard pressed by enemies on all sides and beset by ruin, famine and disease?

Punctual to the minute, Zholtovsky knocked at the door Lenin had indicated. He was met by a young secretary with short-cropped hair.

``You must be Comrade Zholtovsky? Vladimir Ilyich is ready to see you,'' she said.

Zholtovsky walked in. Lenin rose from his desk, walked forward briskly, with his head slightly inclined to one side, and warmly shook his hand. He motioned invitingly towards the armchair.

``Did my invitation come as a surprise, Ivan Vladislavovich?" Lenin asked.

__PRINTERS_P_33_COMMENT__ 3---2330 33

``I was very glad to get it, Vladimir Ilyich,'' answered Zholtovsky quite frankly, still feeling somewhat nervous.

``We are badly in need of your assistance and experience.''

``I shall be happy to oblige in any way I can, Vladimir Ilyich.''

``Comrade Lunacharsky thinks very highly of you and believes you are the best man to carry out some of our plans.''

``I am greatly flattered, Vladimir Ilyich, and am entirely at your service.''

Lenin's face lit up with a soft smile.

``You will admit, I'm sure, that this is quite a surprise: all of a sudden and at such a difficult time, the Bolsheviks broach the subject of long-term plans for Moscow's reconstruction and new building?''

``The reconstruction and new building of Moscow?" Zholtovsky echoed. "But that's wonderful!''

``You are a man of action, and let's come straight to the point: the Soviet Government invites you to take charge of all this work. I have heard that you have already done something in this direction in the newly established design office. I should like to know whether you have the basic idea of a future plan.''

Lenin's posture as he sat in the armchair by Zholtovsky's side---with his head on his hand, a kindly twinkle in his eyes---imparted a sense of homeliness and ease and took the official edge off the conversation.

Zholtovsky suddenly felt a wave of relief, and now, with Lenin talking to him about what he knew and liked so well, at once regained his composure.

Zholtovsky believed that the main idea behind Moscow's development plan should be to build up the areas leading to Vorobyovy = Hills^^*^^ and around Novodevichy Convent. He explained that the prevailing _-_-_

^^*^^ Now Lenin Hills.

34 winds in the city were southwesterly, which made Vorobyovy Hills the healthiest place for new residential areas.

099-7.jpg I. Zholtovsky

``That's a splendid idea,"

exclaimed Lenin and rose to pace the floor. " Vorobyovy Hills, Vorobyovy Hills!" he repeated. "You remember, of course, that it was there that Herzen and Ogarev pledged their friendship. It will not be a bad thing at all if the Bolsheviks start building the new Moscow in that area. Not bad at all, and rather symbolic, I should say.''

Lenin stopped short in front of Zholtovsky and looked at him with his keen and friendly gaze. Zholtovsky found himself rising, but Lenin gently but insistently made him sit back in his armchair.

``Tell me about yourself and your work. I know very little about you.''

For a moment Zholtovsky felt confused and embarrassed: talking to Lenin about yourself was no easy matter. What could he tell about himself? That he had graduated from the Academy of Arts with a gold medal for designing the House of the People? That he had reconstructed the Yusupov Palace in Petrograd, and built the Byelovezhsky Palace? That he had also built the Racing Club in Moscow and numerous mansions for the rich, and had been to Italy? 35 All this would hardly be of interest to Lenin, he thought. Or should he tell Lenin that he, an academician of architecture since 1909, had for many years been carrying on a one-man struggle against the degradation of architectural style in Russia?

He found it appropriate to mention only his design of the House of the People, of which he was really proud. Impetuously, he also expressed his aversion for modern eclecticism.

``Many consider that I am old-fashioned and conservative in my views on architecture. But I can't help myself, I would reject eclecticism at the stake. I must confess that I have thoroughly studied the beautiful creations of the Italian master-builders, the classics of the 15th and 16th centuries---Brunellesco, Rossellino, Alberti and Palladio. That is immortal beauty indeed! We have a lot to learn from the classics.''

``I, too, have a weakness for beauty, for genuine beauty in art,'' said Lenin. "I believe that now you will not be alone in your strivings. There are so many things that demand our immediate attention at present, but I assure you that we will come to that too, in time. And we will then proclaim for all to hear that we must in every way strive towards beauty, using it as a model for the development of art and culture in socialist society.''

Lenin walked up to the window and stopped in meditation.

``It is good that you started your architectural career with the building of the House of the People, and there is no need for you to feel embarrassed over the fact that you have built palaces, mansions and other beautiful buildings for the rich. After all, what else was there for you to build in tsarist Russia considering who your customers were. Your customer now is the socialist state, which, I assure you, will give you much more scope. At present, 36 however, so much needs to be done---so many things that we need! Just take a glimpse at this here: corn-chandlers' shops, gluttons' row, dirt, filth and disorder in the very heart of Moscow. All this needs to be demolished, wiped out. It is national disgrace on display.''

``The remarkable thing,'' said Zholtovsky, "is that on my way here I thought of the same things.''

``Yes, it is too glaring a sight to escape notice. And yet I'd like to draw your attention,'' said Lenin turning abruptly towards Zholtovsky, "to the need of exercising discretion in this question of reconstruction and replacement as some of our comrades are apt to carry destruction too far. We should look deeper into the root of things: removals and replacements, by all means, wherever necessary--- but only after mature consideration. You have been entrusted with drawing up a plan for Moscow's reconstruction and development: what are your views on the Russian people's rich national heritage, the numerous ancient architectural monuments? Of course, I think we could and should create new beautiful structures in place of all these trade rows and flour-shops, but in the area of the Kremlin, Red Square and St. Basil's Cathedral I hardly think we should attempt to elaborate anything, for there is undying beauty there already---we need only to preserve and emphasise it.''

``I fully agree with you,'' exclaimed Zholtovsky, "those are precisely the principles I had in mind.''

``I should also like to ask you,'' Lenin went on, "to give as much thought as you can to Moscow's vegetation. Consider this one of the basic aspects of Moscow's general development plan. In this case your model could be London with its splendid Hyde Park, Paris with its Champs Elysees, Vienna with its picturesque Ring.... Give it some serious thought, including the green-planting of the Moskva's banks. We must see to it that Moscow is well supplied with fr&hair, and plenty of oxygen.''

37 099-8.jpg

As he listened to Lenin, Zholtovsky found himself wholeheartedly in agreement with everything he said. Zholtovsky had a feeling that he was discussing technical details with a fellow architect, and what was most important was that he, an eminent academician, the head of a whole school of Russian architecture, was finding support for some of his own vague ideas. Lenin seemed to rouse and lend wings to his dormant powers.

Zholtovsky immediately accepted the offer to work for the Soviet Government, issuing a challenge to his reactionary-minded colleagues.

In the first few months of the republic, he had come to know many of the Moscow Soviet's functionaries and had sensed that only by working with these men might he realise his youthful dreams of erecting public buildings and whole architectural ensembles.

What Lenin had proposed surpassed all his expectations. Zholtovsky had had some doubts about the need and feasibility of plans for Moscow's general reconstruction and development but Lenin dispelled them all, when he said: "We realise that we have burdened you with a tremendous task whose solution, frankly speaking, requires more than a lifetime. I suggest, therefore, that you select for yourself strong and competent assistants, men with initiative who share your convictions, and who are loyal to the Soviet power. Have you any in mind?''

``I do,'' Zholtovsky hurriedly assured him. "I can name several---Shchussev, Fomin, Tamanyan, Shchuko. They are highly talented architects, fully dependable and meet our requirements.''

Lenin went to his desk and jotted down some notes.

``That's splendid, then put them to work,'' he said with a smile, and rubbed his hands. "Surprising, how flexible the Russian language is, don't you think? Here I just said 'put them to work' and you could take that literally to mean 'sweating for the Soviet power' and a lot more." 38 Then he was serious again. "Well then, we've talked about many things, but you haven't told me of your decision: are you willing to take charge of the task of drawing up Moscow's general reconstruction and development plan?''

Overcome by the solemnity of the moment and strong emotion Zholtovsky uttered the somewhat old-fashioned words which occurred to him: "I shall consider it a great honour to accept this proposal and promise to serve with truth and loyalty.''

Lenin seemed pleased with the answer, or rather with the keen eagerness to start that he sensed in the architect's voice. On his face was a broad smile.

``Truth and loyalty, Ivan Vladislavovich, is just what we need. Tell your friends that the Bolsheviks have come to stay: they are not destroyers or barbarians, as the Western and our own bourgeoisie depicts them. We will yet build and attain such a vast scale and rapid growth of = construe-^^1^^' tion as no bourgeois has ever dreamed of.''

Zholtovsky rose to leave, feeling it fully appropriate to do so as everything had been thoroughly discussed. And although Lenin had in no way implied that the interview was over, Zholtovsky expressed his gratitude for the trust placed in him. Lenin, in turn, thanked him for the talk, and expressed pleasure at having made his acquaintance.

``It is I who should thank you, Vladimir Ilyich.''

``Not at all, Ivan Vladislavovich. We are no longer strangers, and I ask you to come and see me should the need arise. You will encounter many difficulties and will require help, so do not hesitate to come.''

Zholtovsky made a bow, but it was more of a polite refusal than acceptance---he could not imagine he would ever have to come and worry Lenin.

Lenin saw Zholtovsky to the door, shook hands and said, "That was a splendid suggestion of yours---about the 39 Vorobyovy Hills for a new development area. Let our motto be: towards Vorobyovy Hills.''

Outside Zholtovsky, in a mood of exaltation, felt a strange urge: he had no desire whatsoever to go home or to his studio. He turned into a street leading to Red Square. As always, a feeling of deep veneration descended on him at the sight of the Kremlin Wall, the Towers, and the gay domes of St. Basil's. "Lord,'' he thought, "their beauty is truly supernatural.'' He went down towards the bridge, crossed the Moskva and the Kremlin's majestic panorama opened before his eyes. He stood there gazing at a close-up view of the ancient towers, gilt-domed cathedrals and white-stone palaces. From there the crenelated wall seemed to be light and transparent because of its pale-grey hue. "It is true,'' thought Zholtovsky recalling Lenin's words, "this splendour needs only to be emphasised and preserved just as it is. The Kremlin should be clearly visible from all sides---then it will dominate the heart of the city with its unparalleled beauty enhanced.''

Upon his return home, Zholtovsky went straight to his joiner's shop. There he wrote down some of his thoughts about the Kremlin in the light of his conversation with Lenin: "Man needs beauty, for it elevates and ennobles him. Unity of diversity is a major principle of harmony in architectural composition, witness the Moscow Kremlin and the Centre in Petrograd.''

As was his wont Zholtovsky spent several hours in his shop that day. He took off his jacket, put on a blue coat and began to examine different specimens of dry planks. Here he would devote himself for hours to his hobby: planing, sawing, gluing and polishing. He was both a master carpenter and expert furniture-maker, designing many new models and building them with his own hands. Wood was a building material the Russian master-builders had used from time immemorial and Zholtovsky sought to utilise it as an ornamental element.

40

He started planing a plank mechanically, not quite knowing what he would do with it: he needed some physical exercise to let off some of the tension built up on that eventful day.

__*_*_*__

Outwardly, Zholtovsky's life seemed to flow as usual. He alone knew how greatly it had changed since his talk with Lenin.

As chief of the Architectural Department of the Moscow Soviet he was now completely engrossed in blueprinting and replanning Moscow's eleven districts.

He had some highly competent assistants who needed no more than a hint. In view of the large-scale reconstruction work to be done in the capital, the Moscow Soviet set up three additional departments to deal with research, building materials and legislation.

Although Zholtovsky had hoped to manage without worrying Lenin and taking up his valuable time, Lenin himself again invited him to come and see him after a few months. This time the meeting took place in Lenin's office of Chairman of the Soviet of People's Commissars at the Kremlin.

Lenin greeted Zholtovsky as an old friend and then came straight to the point: "I have two big requests. I have been told that the Bolshoi Theatre building is in a precarious state. The experts say that it needs a new foundation, and that it would also be highly desirable to reconstruct and widen its stage. I realise that this is a complex task, but I should like you to undertake this assignment.''

``Put myself to work?" smiled Zholtovsky.

``That's it, precisely---until the sweat comes pouring down.'' Lenin laughed in his contagious way. "I realise full well, my dear Ivan Vladislavovich, that you have enough problems as it is, but there are emergencies, and tasks of first priority, so to speak. The reconstruction 41 of the Bolshoi Theatre and the entire Theatrical Square is one of them.''

``I shall get on with it right away.''

``And what about Okhotny Ryad?''

``I remember our conversation, Vladimir Ilyich. The flour-shops and trading stalls are all to go soon.''

``That will be fine. Well, and how is our general plan working out?''

Zholtovsky told Lenin about the establishment of a design office for Moscow's new development scheme, and the working out of drafts for some of the districts.

``Simultaneously,'' he continued, "we are studying problems of civil engineering to promote and improve the organisation of public services and amenities, including additional green-planting.''

``You mean large green tracts?" asked Lenin.

``Exactly,'' said Zholtovsky.

``I should like to have a glance at the blueprints,'' said Lenin.

Zholtovsky paused, making a mental calculation.

``We shall be able to show you the first drafts for some districts within three weeks, or a month at most.''

``Good thing you mentioned civil engineering. How do you visualise solving the problem of the city's future transport facilities? I believe this too belongs in the general plan?''

``Certainly, Vladimir Ilyich, but we have not looked into things that far ahead.''

``And that's a pity, Ivan Vladislavovich, for you should, and here is why. Moscow will soon, very soon indeed, be facing a growing transportation and traffic problem. Time flies and in five or ten years we shall be told that our streets are clogged with trams and a more rational solution will then be urgently demanded: elevated or underground roads. As a Muscovite, I personally should not like to have any roads above ground. I have seen 42 enough of them, and they only rob a city of its sunlight and pollute the air. Besides the constant din overhead is no pleasure. Now, underground is a different matter. That's where we should start, in the near future, to build our city's underground railway network. That, I think, will be the most rational, convenient and sanitary means of urban transportation.''

Zholtovsky was delighted and marvelled at Lenin's analytical mind and foresight, his capacity to consider a wide range of problems and his cultural scope.

Lenin noticed Zholtovsky's thoughtful expression and inquired: "You don't agree with me, do you? I may be wrong, if so please tell me quite frankly. After all I am not a specialist.''

``Why, Vladimir Ilyich? I have been listening to you very attentively and I consider all your suggestions to be extremely valuable.''

Lenin then said to Zholtovsky in that specially confidential manner which he used when trying to drive home his point: "In order to ensure success we must always think of the workers and peasants, of their needs and interests. Ours is a workers' and peasants' state, and that too is something quite new. And if you will serve it with truth and loyalty, as you once put it, I assure you that the workers and peasants will acknowledge you as their own. At present, there are no architects among them; these will have to be educated and trained.''

``We have already made a start,'' said Zholtovsky. "In Moscow we have organised state art courses which are open to everyone. They are attended by a large number of workers and peasants and their children. As one of the lecturers, I am happy to say that they really thirst for knowledge, and are very resolute and responsive.''

``That's fine,'' exclaimed Lenin. "The thing to understand is that once ignorance and illiteracy are overcome, the workers and peasants and their children will show 43 099-9.jpg their mettle. I assure you that they readily respond to beauty. I know so many fine workers and peasants who have no education, but have keen minds, fine-strung systems, who are clever and are capable of persevering self-education and have achieved very notable results in the face of the poverty, the oppression and the lack of equal opportunity with the rich. What then can we expect of these pent-up forces and talents that have been striving to break loose for centuries? Just give them time. Both you and I are quite advanced in years, but even we shall witness the emergence of the new, Soviet intelligentsia.''

``I'm sure we shall,'' said Zholtovsky. "I intend to live long as my forefathers did. And I insist that you, too, should live at least a hundred years.''

Lenin smiled, wagging his finger. "That's overdoing it, I'm afraid. But, in general, we Bolsheviks are immortal. You must admit that that's something even your forefathers had not managed to achieve.'' "Yes, that's true.''

``There you are. But you, as their successor who has thrown his lot in with the Bolsheviks, will be remembered by posterity---for you are heading towards immortality, particularly since the work you are doing can be easily classed as immortal.''

Lenin again looked at Zholtovsky; he seemed to be sizing the man up, but not in a way that could arouse resentment. "Architecture is a high art, one of the loftiest and at the same time vitally indispensable. That is indisputable. But like all real beauty, architecture should look to the very best of models. But don't forget that real beauty has always been, is and will continue to be an antipode of the philistine idea of beauty. Beware, therefore, of its infiltration: it has a knack of doing this by taking on various superficially attractive forms.''

44

On parting Lenin told Zholtovsky, in a more resolute tone: "Strive by all means to attain beauty, but steer clear philistinism!''

Zholtovsky felt the full strength of Lenin's antipathy for petty-bourgeois standards and always remembered his words.

Lenin gave Zholtovsky an assignment to design and build the All-Russia Agricultural Exhibition on what was formerly a dumping ground on the Moskva's bank.

Lenin again reminded him of green tracts: the pavilions were to be steeped in vegetation, and the longterm scheme was that it should subsequently stretch out along the entire bank from Vorobyovy Hills to the Kremlin.

For the first time in all his 25-year career, Zholtovsky faced such a grand task of complex planning, construction and engineering. With the Exhibition scheduled to open in the spring of 1923, there was very little time indeed.

Together with his assistants Zholtovsky worked tirelessly on the project of the young Soviet Republic's first architectural ensemble, which later became the basis for the sprawling All-Russia Agricultural Exhibition.

Zholtovsky himself built the main gate, the six-sided pavilion, and the theatre and several major pavilions.

The Exhibition as a whole formed a single panorama consisting of large sections, each with its pavilions in consecutive arrangement. Despite its diverse and highly picturesque architectural forms, it constituted an integral whole which gravitated towards the Moskva along a heavy lateral axis running the length of the bank.

45

Here Zholtovsky's favourite building material, wood, was brought out in a new and prominent light. He did not clothe it in plaster, marble or other ``garments'', and this brought out the strongly national Russian character of all the structures.

It is at this period that he wrote down in his note-book some of his remarkable ideas on architecture: "What are the axioms and commandments governing the classical form of the architectural idiom?''

``They are above all realism and proximity to nature. No wonder 'imitation of nature' was the central concept of aesthetics in antiquity which did not imply, however, any naturalistic reproduction of appearances but the creation of an artistic image.''

Zholtovsky envisaged the Exhibition as an integral part of the city's landscape. He did not know then that in time this area would become one of the city's most popular spots---the Gorky Recreation Park---and that the structures, pavilions, squares and green spaces would all fit into the park very nicely.

Zholtovsky, engrossed in his cares in connection with the task of Moscow's redevelopment, wondered: "What makes a city's skyline interesting, impressive and memorable? It is the element of surprise! You walk along a green street and suddenly a building floats into view through an opening or you find yourself in a square. But if both sides of a street are lined with identical fagades, the eye soon tires and ceases to register the architecture.''

Zholtovsky was guided by these principles in projecting the first large development scheme in Moscow and all over the country. The Exhibition marked the beginning of the capital's redevelopment in which a whole district was not just renewed but built anew. Monuments also found a fitting place and application here: the sculpture in wood by Konenkov and the bas-reliefs by Shadr (Ivanov).

46

Zholtovsky knew that Lenin had been gravely ill for a long time.

Since their first meeting five years earlier, Zholtovsky's entire life had undergone a great change. Throughout this period he was so actively involved in many activities and various creative undertakings that he found no time for looking back. It seemed that Lenin's will had been guiding his activities invisibly all these years: he would barely complete one task when another, a still more majestic one, would present itself.

By then, the reconstruction of the Bolshoi Theatre and the adjoining square had been completed; he was almost done with Okhotny Ryad's ungainly stalls, was working on the project of the U.S.S.R. State Bank and altogether immersed in his main preoccupation---the major assignment of his life---the new Moscow plan.

Even in his formative years, when it was so easy to tread the beaten path, Zholtovsky had found the strength and courage not only to reject but even to ignore the precepts and demands of his teachers at the Academy of Arts.

In the period of decline and neglect of the splendid Russian architecture, he suddenly rose up above the rest and took a bold stand for Russian classicism, giving it a new meaning in his structures.

Even greater courage was required of him in the turbulent years of the Civil War, the general confusion, the various fads and ``isms'', the passion for modernism among anarchic intellectuals and ignoramuses, who imagined that the revolution should literally "destroy the old world" with the whole of its cultural legacy.

Zholtovsky's foresight, his deep sense of loyalty to his people, and to art, enabled him to keep his footing in that turbid tide. He managed to keep his head above water. To do so, however, he had to break for good with his old milieu, draw inspiration from the lofty aims of 47 the revolution, and resolutely side with the proletariat. Lenin's care and ready attention in things, big and small, undoubtedly played a highly significant role in all this. Here is a case in point.

One day, Lenin asked Zholtovsky to call on him. That very day, however, someone in the Moscow Soviet had issued orders to evict the architect from his flat. Zholtovsky was thrown off balance, angered and offered a gratuitous insult. In that state he came to the Kremlin.

Lenin did not know what had happened. He was in a radiant mood, his lively eyes full of sparkle: general Frunze's army had just driven the Whites from the Urals, and Lenin, standing by the tiled stove half-covered by a large map, was engaged in pinning little red flags onto it with obvious pleasure.

Zholtovsky was also glad to hear the good news. Lenin as usual got straight to the point. He told Zholtovsky that he had just received some books on architecture from Berlin and wanted to examine them with him.

He couldn't very well refuse, especially since Lenin had mentioned the books before. Nevertheless, Zholtovsky apologised and suggested that they do it some other time.

``But why?" Lenin asked in surprise. Then he noticed that Zholtovsky had something on his mind. The architect had to tell him of the call by the grim commission executing the directive on "getting the surplus living space out of the bourgeoisie" and its order "to clear out of the flat within 24 hours".

Never had Zholtovsky seen Lenin so furious---his entire demeanour changed and he seemed ready to fight. Lenin wanted to know the details: who had come to the flat and who had signed the eviction order.

He then called a secretary and at once dictated an instruction to the Moscow Soviet.

48

Zholtovsky noted that its tenor was highly correct; it was not sent in the name of the Head of Government but only from the chief of the managing department of the Council of People's Commissars. The note was in the form of a request to cancel the eviction order.

Lenin had finished his dictating, smiled and added as an after-thought: "Add this post-scriptum: if necessary, this request will be supported by Comrade Lenin.''

Zholtovsky was handed the instruction, with which the Moscow Soviet complied.

__*_*_*__

Zholtovsky did not feel his age, and had probably never before been so active and happily preoccupied in his life.

The building of the Exhibition convinced him that it was only the beginning of grand schemes, that with Lenin at the helm he was capable of tackling even the most fantastic undertakings.

Zholtovsky was very much alarmed over Lenin's illness. He wanted him to see the Exhibition with his own eyes, but Lenin had long been bed-ridden and saw no one.

Then one sunny October day, Lenin suddenly arrived at the Exhibition. As Zholtovsky learned later, Lenin had come to Moscow from Gorki against his doctors' orders.

He was pale and unusually pensive. As his car stopped at the various pavilions, he would study the sculptures by Konenkov and Shadr, shielding his eyes from the sun with his hand. Later, he drove along the bank with his cap off to enjoy the fresh air.

Zholtovsky never saw Lenin again. In his mind and heart, however, Zholtovsky often communed with him, recalling their conversations, and elaborating ideas whose seeds had been planted by Lenin.

__PRINTERS_P_50_COMMENT__ 4---2330 49 099-10.jpg

There was so much he wanted to discuss with Lenin! He missed Lenin's valuable advice on plans for the future. He remembered the big assignment Lenin had given him, the general plan for Moscow's redevelopment.

``There's enough work there for more than a lifetime,'' he recalled Lenin's words. That was very true, but it had all seemed so much easier when Lenin was alive, for then Zholtovsky always had the benefit of his advice and guidance, his requests and instructions. They had helped him visualise every plan in a broad, bright and realistic aspect and this had always inspired him. His respect for and confidence in Lenin were unparalleled.

Zholtovsky designed the residential blocks along the Bolshaya Kaluzhskaya Avenue and they determined Moscow's new aspect for many years.

He built the splendid building of the City Soviet in Sochi, an impressive combination of grandeur and lightness, and perfect proportions.

He designed and built theatres, administrative buildings and new blocks of flats, and every structure reflected something of his own inimitable architectural style.

Always opposed to drabness, monotony and what he called "barrack architecture'', Zholtovsky all his life struggled against distortion of architectural form. Looking at the buildings designed by some thoughtless architects today, one wonders how Zholtovsky would have assessed them. We don't suppose he would have endorsed all of them.

Those who worked with him, imitated his style of work: lack of haste and thoroughness.

``Architecture is not to be trifled with,'' he would say, when examining the project of a constructivist. " Thoughtlessness in this matter may have a bad effect on the taste of generations and create inconveniences. Who said it was easier to pull down a building than to build one? But it is a pity to destroy a building---isn't it? Ungainly though it is it could stand for hundreds of years. We can 50 be sure that Lenin would not praise us for such a project.''

Zholtovsky often turned to Lenin in his thoughts. He cherished this inner relationship through the years of his long life.

With Lenin in his heart, he went on building tirelessly, with faith in immortality.

An upright, inflexible man, he lived a really long life, almost a century.

Boris Kostyukovsky

[51]

THE PEN
AS A BAYONET

[52] 099-11.jpg [53]

Lenin, October 1918

[54] __ALPHA_LVL1__ THE PEN AS A BAYONET

It is hard to give a portrait of Felix Kon, a revolutionary and writer, and a man of many parts. Beneath the simple exterior of a good mixer was a complex nature, a character not easily fathomed. He loved life, but with youthful abandon he deliberately faced death on three occasions, risking his own life for others. The common cause, the struggle against evil, his comrades' assignments in things big or small, filled his entire being. His ability to contain himself---to quell his own passions if they might hurt the cause---not his own but that of the revolution---showed how modest, scrupulous and firm he was.

In all his endeavours Felix Kon always championed a noble cause.

1

''. . . On His Imperial Majesty's order of December 8, 1885, the Provisional Military Tribunal of the Warsaw Alexandrov Citadel heard the cases of ...'' droned the monotonous voice of a pale wiry official in the small gloomy prison hall.

Kon remembered the official and his voice for the rest of his life: the thin hunched-up figure with wrinkled neck 55 in a tight collar; narrow starched cuffs sticking out of the sleeves and rattling against the table. He could repeat word for word the indictment, the speeches of the prosecutors, the fiery words of his comrades and even the emotional and witty improvisations of the famous lawyer, Vladimir Spasovich.

The sentence read in part: "At the end of 1882 and the beginning of 1883, within the Vistula region, a society was formed calling itself the 'Proletariat' Social-- Revolutionary Party, whose aim was the violent overthrow of the existing state, social and economic order in Russia.''

The well-groomed military prosecutor---who was probably something of a society man---spoke first and demanded the application of article 249, which carried the death-penalty to all the accused. A chilly silence descended on the hall. Generals and officers who had come to the trial all turned their gaze towards GovernorGeneral Gurko, who sat in the centre of the hall in his red damask-upholstered and gilded armchair in full view of all.

The next three prosecutors also demanded the death penalty. They spoke of the Warsaw "proletariats'" ideological ties with the St. Petersburg terrorists, of the "martyrdom of His Imperial Majesty Alexander II, the tsar-liberator'', and of the revolution threatening Russia. But for all their gesticulations and intonations, their speeches were something of an anti-climax.

All eyes were turned to Gurko, who was peering at the faces of the defendents, and his own face said: "Is all this taking place in my governorship? What will the tsar say?''

The tribunal knew what was required of it. But only six of the accused---carefully selected for police reasons to serve as an object lesson---were condemned to death. The others were sentenced to long terms of hard labour. Felix Kon was given 10 years and 8 months.

That was young Felix Kon's first experience of ``justice'',

56

Later, two of the death sentences were commuted by an act of royal ``mercy'', but the noble hearts of four revolutionaries stopped beating on the dawn of January 28, 1886.

099-12.jpg

F. Kon

2

Felix Kon never forgot another morning, when he was thousands of miles away from Warsaw, in Nerchinsk District, where he had already spent three years of ``instruction'' at a H. M. hard labour " university" in Kara. . ..

On October 24, 1889, the convicts were ordered to leave their cells and to line up in the corridor under a heavy guard. His voice showing signs of strain, Lieutenant-Colonel Masyukov read out Governor-General Baron Korff's order on the application of corporal punishment to political prisoners on a par with ordinary criminals. This decision of the Amur Territory's vicegerent was designed to strike fear into the hearts of the inmates who had protested against the prison regime and their barbaric treatment by Masyukov of the special gendarmes corps, the commandant of the Kara prisons.

The order was heard out in silence, and the men went back to their cells. Only there did they show signs of agitation.

How were they to protest? Some said a letter should be sent to the Minister of Internal Affairs, demanding immediate cancellation of the illegal order. Others proposed circulating a statement all over Russia and even abroad.

57

The fiery and resolute Felix Kon wanted more: a blow for a blow.

He proposed that until the sadistic baron revoked his order, two men should commit suicide every day by drawing lots!

``That's anarchism!" cried the ``moderates''. "We do not share Nechayev's anarchistic methods!''

``In that case, so much the worse for you: do you imagine that only anarchists have revolutionary firmness!" exclaimed Bobokhov, who was very popular with everyone. "What do you propose?''

``We must protest against barbarous methods but must not resort to them ourselves.''

No decision was reached after all. Shortly afterwards, however, it was learned that a certain Nadezhda Konstantinovna Malaksiano-Sigida, a new arrival from Petropavlovskaya Fortress had decided to sacrifice her life. Under the pretext of wishing to convey some secret information to Masyukov she obtained an interview, and slapped him in the face. She was flogged to death.

In protest, Sigida's cell mates---Kalyuzhnaya, Kovalevskaya and Smirnitskaya---poisoned themselves. This brought the total of deaths to four.

``The women are protesting! They are not afraid to die, but we are scared!" cried the indignant Kon.

``What do you propose?''

``If you don't want to die in pairs, I suggest we barricade ourselves in the barrack, drench the walls with paraffin oil and burn ourselves alive! The flames which burn us will rise high up above the prison-house of Russia and will be seen by all its people and the world.''

``We shall burn, but the penal colonies will still be there. This will change nothing. The autocracy cannot be toppled by a bunch of individuals."

58

``What is worse, you want us to go back to witchcraft, to the Middle Ages!''

But the hot-headed young people remained undaunted. It was decided to take a poll in the barrack to determine who was prepared to poison himself in protest.

The volunteers were fourteen, nine of them were students of the universities of Kharkov, Moscow, Novorossiisk (Odessa), Kiev, Warsaw and St. Petersburg.

Poison was procured from the medicine chest. Farewell letters were written to relatives.

At the appointed hour, a song was heard from the cell occupied by Kon and his friends. It was the prearranged signal. The men took leave of each other.

Many of those remaining had tears in their eyes and implored their comrades to change their minds. They said their sacrifice was useless; there would be no changes for the better. But it was too late.

The three bosom friends---Sergei Bobokhov, sentenced to twenty years, Ivan Kalyuzhny (the brother of Maria, who had poisoned herself with her cell mates), a student of Kharkov University, and Felix Kon lay down on the plank-beds, embraced, and took opium.

But in the night they woke up to a horrible nightmare which was worse than death.

There was a reserve supply of morphine hidden in the wall of one of the cells, but it was not available until morning, for all the cell doors had been locked for the night. They had to wait.

They waited until morning, concealing their agony, physical and mental, from the warders and even their cell mates; they even went through the routine check-up as if everything was in order.

Once again "the living" tried hard to dissuade "the dead'', five of whom eventually yielded to their pleas.

The day seemed to drag on for ever. They felt crushed, annihilated. Dying is always an excruciating business, 59 but dying a second death is terrible. In the evening nine people took poison again. Kon felt a throbbing pain in his temples, nausea and a cramp in his stomach; his heart beat unevenly, his breath came in gasps and he was covered with sticky sweat. Before losing consciousness, he saw Bobokhov and Kalyuzhny scraping up what was left of the morphine in the jar; with feeble hand he too reached out for it and swallowed what was left.

He awoke again at dawn. He heard the agonised groans of Sergei Bobokhov and saw the breathless body of Ivan Kalyuzhny. ... He saw the convulsions of Nikolai Senkovsky, a former excise official, whose death sentence for firing at Cherevin, a minister of the court, was later commuted to hard labour for life. Kiev University student Pavel Ivanov lay prostrate nearby.

No, indeed, this was no nightmare; it was stark reality.

The warders were already hustling in the barrack; prison doctor Pribylev was pouring an antidote into the mouths of the suicides; the dead and the dying were being carried out and efforts were being made to revive them with artificial respiration.

Bobokhov and Kalyuzhny died, the others were restored to life by force.

What were they to do now? How were they to live today and tomorrow?

Did it mean that they should give up? No, they must act! They must compel the prison authorities to retreat. Once again, three students---Andrian Mikhailov of Moscow, Sergei Dikovsky of Odessa and Felix Kon, keeping strict secrecy even from their own cell mates, decided to continue the struggle by resorting to the same method. They resolved to die for the third time.

It was agreed that Dikovsky and Kon would die first and if that brought no result, Andrian Mikhailov was to follow a fortnight later.

60

Luckily, a ministerial decree abolished corporal punishment, and Masyukov was threatened with dismissal from his post. Soon afterwards the prison was closed down. Many others including the Akatui prison still remained but the Kara prison was gone, and that was victory!

3

There followed the long grueling years of exile in Yakutia, itself a prison without bars, and later in Irkutsk, Balagansk and Minusinsk.

It was in Minusinsk that Kon met Lenin, the man who was to steer so sharp a turn in the course of mankind's social history. But who could have known then that humanity would soon take a new road and that Lenin would become the leader of the world's proletariat, and the pilot of the socialist revolution?

On that warm autumn day, September 27, 1897, Kon saw a stocky young man of 27, of medium height, who had a pair of keen eyes on a tanned intelligent face. He wore a small curly beard and a drooping moustache and had that easy and jocular manner which was typical of students.

As usual at that time of the year in Minusinsk, a sandy wind blew steadily in from the Sayan Mountains. Lenin, soft cap lowered over prominent forehead, left hand clasping the lapels of his spring-coat with velvet collar, was walking down the street of this backwoods little town with Semyon Raichin, an exiled SocialDemocrat.

``Here, Kon,'' shouted Raichin, a noisy, boisterous and rather defiant man, who preferred to keep to himself.

Felix stopped on the shaky boardwalk near the local lore museum founded by Martyanov. There was something familiar about the stranger's face.

Kon realised that he was another exile. But who was he? He had heard that about four months ago a group 61 from the League of Struggle for the Emancipation of the Working Class---Ulyanov, Starkov, Krzhizhanovsky, Lengnik, Shapovalov and Lepeshynsky----had arrived in these parts. He wondered if it was Ulyanov.

``Oh yes, I have heard about you,'' said Lenin, slightly rolling his rs. He shook hands with Kon.

They walked on together, and Lenin inquired about life in the colony, about Tyrkov, Tyutchev, Yakovlev and Melnikov, what was being done and whether contacts were being maintained with Moscow, Petersburg and the comrades in the East.

``I have come to meet the comrades,'' said Lenin. "You must tell me all about yourself. I've heard all sorts of curious stories but prefer to hear them at first hand.''

Kon told Lenin briefly about himself. Lenin asked him about his activities in Yakutia, what he had written and published there, and what he knew of the everyday life of the Kachin, the Sagai and the Kizil minorities inhabiting the area.

``I want to go to the Martyanov museum, of which I heard so much in Krasnoyarsk. I also want to find a few things at the library---on Russia's economic development, and on factory legislation. Will you be my guide?''

``No one knows the museum better than Felix,'' said Raichin, "and Martyanov often leaves him in charge of it.''

Kon seemed to wince.

``Will you be staying here long?" he asked Lenin.

``You mean in Minusinsk? Oh, a couple of days. Besides seeing the comrades, I have other business: file a complaint with the magistrate in the case of a friend of mine Basil, Vassily Starkov. Then I need to call at the PostOffice because a parcel of books is long overdue, and also to do some shopping. By the way, can one buy a pair of felt boots over here? I am told that now is just the time to get them for the winter. I also need a lamp, and 62 an alarm-clock.'' Lenin laughed, adding, "Will you believe it, I simply cannot wake up early. I must have caught up on all the sleep I missed during the pre-trial detention, but I still sleep like a log.''

Kon also laughed, and said, "I think we'll manage to get the felt boots, the lamp and the paraffin oil, but have doubts about the alarm-clock. The local shopkeepers are not that sharp: they don't restock until they sell out.''

``You know, the Petersburg force of habit is still strong,'' said Lenin. "I imagine I can go out and buy what I need. In Shushenskoye, there's nothing to be got at all. Minusinsk, by comparison, is a metropolitan city!''

Raichin suddenly got all excited and hustled away without a word.

``Where is he off to?" asked Lenin.

``Hard to say. He's an odd sort of fellow.''

``Well, and how do you find things down here?" Lenin asked. Kon was thoughtful.

``Well, it's not too bad, after Yakutia, Balagansk especially. What a hole! You know, out there I found myself yearning for the hard-labour prison. I shudder to think of it.''

Nikolai Martyanov was out. He had gone to the Abakan Iron-Smelting Works. Kon introduced Lenin to Martyanov's wife, Yelena, and then showed him round. They walked from room to room, and Kon explained where and how the indefatigable Martyanov had obtained the various exhibits.

Kon spoke with much feeling, clearly enjoying himself.

``I see that you are quite at home here; ethnography must be your element,'' said Lenin.

Kon sighed, "What else is there?''

``Are you quite sure?" asked Lenin.

``It's getting on for fourteen years.''

``Fourteen years!" There was sadness in Lenin's eyes. 63 ``Yes, the sacrifice of our revolutionaries is very great indeed!''

Lenin then took Kon to his furnished rooms, where they drank tea out of a samovar, nibbling bits of sugar. Lenin made Kon tell again about life in Yakutia, the Sibiryakov expedition organised by the Yakutian Statistical Committee, and the scientific and literary work of the exiles.

``I took a census of the Khatyn-Arynsk Skoptsi^^*^^ settlement in the Namsk Ulus area; I looked into farming in Yakutsk District and collected material on anthropology. Among other things, the expedition wanted to find out whether the Yakut people were growing or dying out. We collected some very valuable material on the life of the Yakuts and the Russians. Last year I managed to publish some of it in the Proceedings of the East-Siberian Department of the Geographical Society."

``Any response?''

``Yes, some scientists noted my work, 'The KhatynArynsk Skoptsi Settlement'.''

``I should very much like to read it. Is there a copy in the local library?''

``Yes, there is. The library here is almost as large as the one in Krasnoyarsk.''

``Oh, I have been to that one and even had the honour of being attended by Yudin himself. The old man claims to have collected about eighty thousand books.''

``Despite the commercial mentality, I believe the figure is no exaggeration.''

``And what are you working on now?''

``I am completing another study: 'Physiological and Biological Data on the Yakuts'. Perhaps I shall be able to publish it here. I also write essays and articles for several Siberian journals and newspapers.''

``Where is your family?''

_-_-_

^^*^^ A religious sect practising castration.---Tr.

64

``I was married in Yakutia. My wife, Christina, a political exile, has served her term and is now staying with some relatives in Nikolayev, together with our three children.''

Over tea, Kon expounded his views, which still betrayed many Narodnik prejudices. Lenin listened attentively, eyes slightly narrowed, and argued in a tactful, friendly way.

The next day, Kon helped Lenin to get some books at the library and buy a few things.

They met again in November.

Even before Lenin's arrival in Shushenskoye, Kon, in Minusinsk, had studied books, brochures and appeals dealing with the class struggle. He had read Marx and Engels and had been gradually evolving from a " proletariat" who thought Marxism compatible with terroristic acts on behalf of the masses, to a revolutionary Marxist. Through Victor Kurnatovsky he learned of the activities of the League of Struggle for the Emancipation of the Working Class.

Kon realised that the new arrivals who were Marxists could help him sort out some of the more intricate questions of the class struggle, and understand the strategy and tactics of the proletarian revolution. When he was leaving on a visit to Starkov and Krzhizhanovsky in Tesinskoye, the Narodopravtsy (People's Right) men had jealously warned him, "Watch out. See that you don't join them!" That was something Kon was not afraid of: the important thing for him was to find the answers that had given him no peace of mind since he first came across some Marxist literature in Kara. It was bound in covers bearing the most innocent titles on history and economics.

Exiles arriving in Eastern Siberia spoke much about Lenin, a remarkable lawyer from Samara, who was the brother of Alexander Ulyanov, of the People's Will group. It was known that Lenin had lectured and __PRINTERS_P_65_COMMENT__ 5---2330 65 organised the first Marxist group in Samara. Later he had carried on revolutionary activities in St. Petersburg, and in 1894 published a book, What "the Friends of the People" Are and Plow They Fight the Social-Democrats? He had published an article called "Frederick Engels'', and had prepared the first issues of Rabocheye Dyelo, an illegal paper.

Kon wanted to meet Lenin as soon as the latter arrived in Shushenskoye on May 8, 1897, but did not find the opportunity to do so. He got his chance when Lenin came to Minusinsk: this resolved his doubts as to whether it was appropriate to thrust himself upon Lenin. Kon found Lenin much easier to get along with than all the other Marxists he had met. He was sparing of a person's selfrespect, had more human warmth and was more affable.

Nadezhda Krupskaya and her mother arrived in Minusinsk in early May 1898.

From Lenin's letters she knew about the exile colony at Minusinsk, and was bringing a letter for her schoolfriend's brother, Arkady Tyrkov, who came from a noble family of ancient standing and had been let off with his life at the trial of the March First^^*^^ case. She conveyed to Tyrkov the regards of his relatives, and there met Felix Kon. Their meeting was just as friendly and as open-hearted as with Lenin. Felix helped the two women with some inquiries at the Post-Office (a parcel was overdue) and then went in search of a cart to take them to Shushenskoye.

Yegor Filatov, one of those convicted in "the case of the fifty'',^^**^^ lived nearby on a farmstead. Kon persuaded him to take the women to Shushenskoye. It was a pity that _-_-_

^^*^^ On March 1, 1881, members of the People's Will terrorist group assassinated the Russian tsar Alexander.

^^**^^ "The case of the fifty" (March 1877) where populists were accused of disseminating revolutionary propaganda among the workers.

66 he himself did not go along, for that may have helped him to break with the ``proletariats''.

There followed much controversy among the exiles over Semyon Raichin, who threw down a challenge to the "People's Right Elders''. It was established tradition that any exile making his escape was provided with money, documents and shelter. But it was an unwritten law that no escape was to be attempted on officially granted leave for a medical or other purpose. Raichin failed to warn anyone and the others had no time to hide their illegal literature in advance of the raids that followed. Some condemned him, others sought to justify him. Relations within the populist ranks were aggravated but there was no siding with the Marxists. Kon found himself alone, and feeling it keenly. So when the Geographical Society's East-Siberian branch offered him a trip beyond the Sayan Mountains, he accepted it without hesitation.

Kon did not meet Lenin again for a long time. The Trans-Sayan expedition lasted almost four and a half years. Kon collected much interesting material and performed a truly Herculean task:'he led the expedition, and did the research, and the laboratory work. He was the first researcher ever to make a thorough study of the Tuva people's everyday life: their farming and hunting, their crafts, arts, games, national festivities and beliefs. He brought back detailed diaries and sketches, heaps of photographs, specimens of their craftwork, and even bones and skulls for craniologieal research.

Kon was given a triumphal greeting by the scientists of Irkutsk. Irkutskiye Vedomosti published an article on the successful return of the expedition he headed, and named the hotel where he stopped. The Geographical Society intended to stage a public reception in his honour; billboards were put up and invitations issued. But Governor-General, Count Kutaisov, put his foot down. For 67 him, Kon was nothing but a political exile, without any rights.

Kon delivered a brief report at a closed meeting of the Geographical Society's committee. His only concern was that the material, collected with such pains, should not fall into the hands of ignoramuses. His report, the exhibits and his account of the numerous adventures on the expedition evoked delight. He was thanked officially, and promised that everything would be duly utilised and his literary and scientific works published. Thus ended Kon's expedition, on which he was accompanied only by a guide and an interpreter.

After Minusinsk and the Trans-Sayan settlements, Irkutsk was a splendid capital city. Kon looked forward to meeting his fellow prisoners from Warsaw, Kara and Yakutia, but he was disappointed: ideologically they were out of touch. During the solitary years of his expedition, Kon continued to think of Lenin and Kurnatovsky, pondering over his own political attitudes. But now in Irkutsk, having met his old comrades, with whom he once saw eye to eye, he discovered that there was a gulf between them. His old friends thought it was he and not they who were to blame.

In low spirits, Kon returned to Minusinsk, the " twoby-four town'', Lenin used to call it; 1903 was coming to a close and war seemed imminent.

Lenin was no longer in Shushenskoye. Kon was told that late one night at the end of January, three years earlier, Lenin, Nadezhda and her mother had arrived in Minusinsk and had left the following morning for Achinsk, 300 versts away. They travelled in a low wide sledge through the dense mist caused by the bitter cold. Lenin, his family and friends then went on to Ufa and Pskov, from where they went abroad.

Kon learned that Lenin had done a great deal of work in Shushenskoye, and had written several major studies, among them The Development of Capitalism in Russia. 68 The book was discussed chapter by chapter, by the Minusinsk Social-Democrats. Russkiye Vedomosti said it was published at the end of March 1899, under the pen name of Vladimir Ilyin.

Lenin had also written many reviews and articles and made several translations from the German; he had started to work on a draft programme of the R.S.D.L.P.

While Kon was away, Lenin had made several visits to Minusinsk, where he had talks with the exiles and had held meetings.

After his long absence Kon felt completely at a loss and he was not much heartened even by the news that he had been awarded a gold medal and half of the Rastsvetov Prize for his outstanding work on the expedition.

Shortly afterwards Kon's term of exile came to an end. "What has a beginning must have an end.'' It was time to return home.

Twenty years had elapsed since his arrest in Warsaw. To his disappointment, he was met there not as a living revolutionary but as a martyr, an icon. This was not what he had expected at all, he had not suffered the long years of hard labour to be canonised. Was it possible that people lived merely on memories of the heroic past?

However, Kon's reunion with his old and tireless friend Kwiatkowski-Tadeusz, who was still full of go, convinced him that Warsaw had undergone some changes which he had not at first noticed. The workers were fired with a firm belief in an early inevitable victory, and the advent of a new era.

One day, he saw a workers' demonstration. They marched through the streets of Warsaw with banners on one of which Felix read the names of his four comrades who had been sentenced to death on that fateful dawn of January 28. Their names blazed. The revolution 69 lived on, full of faith in its strength and in the future. The past and the present merged into a single powerful tide---and that was just what Kon wanted to see and to feel!

After long years of solitude, he was again communing with life, with a real revolution, which poured new strength into everyone who dedicated himself to it heart and soul.

4

Kon's next meeting with Lenin took place in 1907 at the August Congress in Stuttgart, which Kon attended as a representative of the P.S.P. Lewica.^^*^^ It was Lenin's first international meeting.

In preparation for the conference, Kon was sent by the P.S.P. to ``inspect'' its Paris, London, Zurich and other sections abroad. The impression of the trip was very depressing: there was widespread ideological dissension and lack of any clear view of common aims.

This fact was even more glaringly revealed at the Stuttgart Congress of the 2nd International. The Polish delegation was a strange conglomerate of parties, ranging from the extreme Left (Rosa Luxemburg) to the extreme Right (Jozef Pilsudski).

Lenin only smiled when Kon told him of this: people with different aims and convictions had to sit down to one table, and their very first discussion, on the distribution of mandates, ended in dispute. Rosa Luxemburg and other members of the Polish Social-Democratic Party and the P.S.P. ``Left'' walked out.

``Only the tail-coats remain: men from the Galicia and Poznan groups.''

``The Poles call the splinter groups 'tail-coats', eh?" Lenin asked Kon. "Very witty, indeed!''

_-_-_

^^*^^ The Left wing of the petty-bourgeois nationalist Polish Socialist Party.---Ed.

70

Lenin did not speak at the Stuttgart Congress: his opponents were far superior in number and it would have been futile to attempt an open struggle. Lenin was a member of the commission drafting the resolution on "Militarism and International Conflicts''. In the intervals between sittings, he mixed with the delegates, and recruited supporters among the waverers.

At the Congress, Kon noticed that other delegations were also ill-assorted. Among the delegates were such famous opportunists as David and van Kol who defended the right of civilised nations to oppress and exploit colonial peoples; the fiery Jaures, the well-known extempore orators, Adler, Ferri and Daszynski, the shrewd demagogue Vandervelde, the anarchist-minded phrasemonger Herve, and the tired "patriarch of the 2nd International'', August Bebel, who retained something of the old Marxist traditions, but whose revolutionary ardour was gone.

In this "political Babylon'', Lenin and Rosa Luxemburg had the difficult task of drawing the opportunist sting from Bebel's resolution. By means of subtle amendments Lenin imparted to the resolution a Marxist content: in the event of an international armed conflict the workers were to convert the imperialist war into a civil war.

Lenin said to Kon after the conference, "Although the resolution itself is much too long, it does contain valuable ideas and clearly indicates the proletariat's tasks. It will undoubtedly hasten the Russian Social-Democrats' decisive break with neutralism, of which our liberals are so fond.''

Lenin and Kon left Stuttgart together on August 11. Lenin was returning to Kuokkala, Finland, and Kon to Cracow. They boarded the same train to travel together to Nuremberg. Night was falling, and a thick candle was lit in the lantern over the coach door. Stuttgart---Hegel's birthplace and the centre of the Baden-Wiirttemberg state---was a medium-sized industrial town lying in the 71 valley of the Nekkar, a tributary of the Rhine. They were now leaving it behind, and carrying away with them the impressions of the week's debates.

They could now relax, and the clatter of wheels invited them to a leisurely sharing of impressions. For a while Lenin sat in meditation, then said, "I recollect the banquet held in the countryside. A sort of children's picnic,'' he added, screwing up his eyes.

Kon looked up at Lenin, who went on:

``Beer, wine, delicacies, sweet speeches and charming smiles were all brought into play in an attempt to unite what cannot be united!''

It was an interesting episode, indeed. Bebel, with a group of admirers, making a solemn round of all the delegations and raising toasts:

``Meine Kinder,'' he would always say, and then carry on with praise for those who supported the views of the 2nd International leaders, and paternal rebukes and admonishments for the recalcitrants. The Russians were regarded as "dissenters and sectarians''. Kon was among the Russians.

``Why do you dislike us?" Litvinov suddenly asked as Bebel 'drew up to the Russian delegation and was about to say his piece.

Bebel was taken aback and there was a hush on the meadow. But conscious of his position, he smiled, saying, "I like everyone! But Bolshevism is 'kinderkrankheit', an infantile disease. It will soon pass.''

Standing by the coach seat, Lenin chuckled, "That was damned good!''

That had been one occasion when everyone realised the sharp differences between the two trends in the contemporary working-class movement. One of these trends was losing its revolutionary character, just as the last and crucial struggle drew near; the other was gaining in strength and confidence as the revolution developed, 72 coming to the fore to lead the struggle for the dictatorship of the proletariat and communism.

The wheels throbbed, the candle flickered in an unsteady light, and Lenin's mind went back to Minusinsk and the exiles.

``I read somewhere,'' he said to Kon, "that after the publication of your work on the Tuva people, no new studies can be made without reference to yours. You were a pioneer in that area, and have made a big contribution to science.''

``You overrate my merits,'' Kon said.

``Not at all. You're just being modest.''

Again Kon recalled the 27-year-old Lenin in the old days, when he too was an exile and one of them.

They returned to the Congress and Polish affairs, with which Lenin was preoccupied.

``It is a complicated situation with us,'' said Kon. "All this hostility, dissent and splits. Pilsudski is prepared to rely on the most frantic chauvinists to seize power.''

``They don't seem to understand that it is not socialism for national independence, but national independence for the struggle for socialism. Speaking frankly, Comrade Kon, in my opinion your 'Leftists' also seem to be half inclined to revise the principles of P.S.P. nationalism. You need once and for all to switch to Marxism, to the path of socialist revolution, the path of proletarian dictatorship.''

``You're right. I have been giving this much thought, on my Sayan expedition, and later on in Poland, and not without success, I believe. But the past is not easy to throw off.''

``That's true, the important thing is to realise that this needs to be done.''

For a few moments they were both silent.

``The Congress left me with vague feelings,'' said Kon, not wishing to discuss personal matters.

``Vague, did you say? Not at all. The question is quite 73 clear. We managed to achieve something, but, of course, I have no illusions. In the event of an armed conflict the present leaders of the 2nd International will not implement even this resolution. That's opportunism for you.''

Lenin asked Kon how he had managed to get permission in Minusinsk to go abroad.

Kon explained that the Geographical Society's Eastern branch, after his Yakutia expedition, invited him to go on another expedition to study the UryankhaitSoyot people. Count Kutaisov, the Governor-General of Irkutsk, had no idea where this people lived, and gave his consent.

To his great embarrassment he subsequently learned that they lived outside the tsarist empire, and that a foreign passport had to be issued. As a political exile, Kon had to surmount many obstacles to travel even in Siberia. In the circumstances what could the Count do if he was not to expose his ignorance. After some usual red tape, Kon received his passport.

Lenin laughed heartily.

``A most characteristic story from the life of the tsarist satraps! I myself have a few such curiosities to tell. But that's an old story.''

``But always new,'' Kon quoted from Heine, and added, "as long as the tsarist regime is there.''

5

The Stuttgart Congress, Kon's talk with Lenin in the train and all the subsequent events that followed in his life led Kon towards the path of which Lenin had spoken.

Later, when the World War broke out and Lenin was arrested at Poronin in Austria-Hungary in the summer of 1914, Kon and his friends did everything possible to get him out. In Switzerland, when the war had caused a split in the 2nd International, Kon had many opportunities 74 of seeing many other facets of Lenin's character, talent and ability to work with people.

Kon supported the Bolsheviks at the Zimmerwald and Kienthal conferences, and fulfilled his international duty by struggling against opportunism and helping to establish revolutionary Marxist, Communist parties.

Kon had frequent meetings with Lenin in Switzerland. These took place generally at Lenin's small suburban flat near the woods in Berne, at the Marmenthal, an inexpensive boarding-house in the small mountain village of Sb'renberg, at the Zum Alder Cafe in Zurich; at the various highly efficient libraries, or at the Emigre's Mutual Aid Bureau, of which Kon was chairman and Nadezhda Krupskaya, secretary.

Lenin used to say:

``There are still many trying days ahead of us. We have learned to wait, however, and will find the necessary patience. But it does seem that the West-European workers are inconceivably timid and tolerant. The Russian muzhik's patience is proverbial, but I'm afraid they have outdone him.''

During the war, when the various functionaries of the 2nd International made an open deal with their bourgeoisie, Lenin demanded a complete break with the traitors. He urged the establishment of a new International, one that would be free of opportunism and socialchauvinism. Only such an International, he declared, could command the support of the workers, transform the imperialist war into a civil war and end all wars.

Illumined by Lenin's ideas, Kon was able to see more clearly his old mistakes, the truth of the present, and the contours of the distant future. Then came the February Revolution, his return to Russia, and the Great October Socialist Revolution.

In 1918, a hard but glorious year, Kon joined the Bolshevik Party. He had matured politically.

When bourgeois Poland attacked the young Soviet 75 state, Kon became editor of the Polish paper Glos komunistyczny (The Voice of the Communist), which was circulated among the Poles within the ranks of the Red Army and the Pilsudski legionnaires. He wrote appeals urging his compatriots to turn their weapons against their own bourgeoisie, and advocated peace and friendship between Poland and Russia and their peoples. In 1920, when the Red Army units were approaching Warsaw, Kon was elected member of the Provisional Revolutionary Committee in Belostok, Poland's first workers' government.

That autumn, Kon returned to the Ukraine, where he was elected member of the newly-formed C.C. of the Ukrainian Bolshevik Communist Party, which in March 1921 elected him its Secretary. Being a hard worker himself, Kon was also very demanding of others. After the Civil War and the intervention things had to be restored from scratch. Agriculture had to be revived, factories and mines restarted to provide the people with light and warmth.

Later, Kon returned to Moscow, where from 1922 to 1935 he was on the Comintern's Executive Committee, and concurrently and later edited several newspapers and journals, e.g., Krasnaya Zvezda, Rabochaya Gazeta, Sovietsky Muzei and Nasha Strana; he also wrote a number of pamphlets for young people.

Kon headed numerous committees, departments and organisations, including the Art Sector of the People's Commissariat for Education of the R.S.F.S.R., the AilUnion Radio Committee, the Museum Department of the People's Commissariat for Education, and the Revolutionary, Artistic and Cultural Monuments Committee, the Political Prisoners' Society, and the International Organisation for Aid to Revolutionary Fighters.

The list alone shows the boundless energy of the man who was then---in 1924---sixty years old.

Apart from numerous political, publicistic, historical, 76 scientific and biographical articles, pamphlets, monographs and studies, Kon also wrote Over the Past 50 Years---four volumes of his memoirs. This work has been reprinted a number of times and contains much valuable historical data on the revolutionary movement in Poland and Russia at the turn of the century. He gives a vivid description of the life of the revolutionaries of that period, the prevailing moods and aspirations of the various classes and social strata. He gives a graphic portrayal of life in irons and hard labour. His memoirs also contain much that is of special interest to students of the Yakut and Tuva peoples. His is a delightful combination of the competent ethnographer, anthropologist and statistician with the talented writer.

Kon's fellow journalists noted his distinctly Leninist style of work as editor, and in his selection of staffs and organisation of editorial work. B. Barova, recollecting the period when Kon was editor of Krasnaya Zvezda, wrote: "At that time many soldiers and commanders were not too literate, but Kon would tell them, 'Write, and don't mind the grammar. That will come later, but it is now, just now and not tomorrow, that you must start taking an active part in social life.' "

Kon's sincere and heartfelt attitude to others won him the confidence of all, and this enabled him to mould the men and women under him into a strong, united and welldisciplined collective. He reiterated Lenin's idea, that publishing is a highly important and responsible Party assignment, and that every line should be directed towards the promotion of the Party's aims and tasks. Lenin used to say, "If a journal lacks clear direction it becomes an absurd, scandalous and harmful thing.'' Kon took this for his main principle.

Kon disliked loud words and gave more space to reports which brought out the features of the new Soviet life and the new human relations. At editorial meetings or when briefing correspondents, Kon reminded his colleagues of 77 Lenin's instructions "to keep closer to life, to pay more attention to the way in which the workers and peasants were actually building the new in their everyday work, and more verification so as to ascertain the extent to which the new was communistic".

Kon was against sensational articles. He demanded primarily a down-to-earth approach when writing about any event, with a thorough analysis of its facts and causes.

Kon was intolerant of artificiality and insincerity. He was simple in his treatment of people, and they came to him with news, or for a friendly exchange of opinion, for he showed great interest in everything that took place in the country. But despite his simplicity he resented slackness and familiarity and was strongly critical of conceit.

With the publication of the Rabochaya Gazeta's 2,000th jubilee issue in 1928, Kon became editor of this organ of the Bolshevik Party's Central Committee. It was an 8- or 12-page affair and had special pages for Leningrad, the Urals and the Ukraine. It also published magazine supplements, and in 1929 had a circulation of more than 1,200,000. It had more than 14,000 worker correspondents, and received up to 400 letters a day.

With his appointment in February 1930 as head of the Art Sector of the People's Commissariat for Education, Kon also introduced the Leninist style of work into the field of art. He travelled all over the country and held meetings and conferences for the promotion of friendly ties and contacts between Moscow theatre companies, actors, artists, writers and composers and their counterparts in outlying provinces. All this took time, care and fine understanding of the problems involved.

In the summer of 1930 the arrival in Moscow of 18 national theatre companies and 10 ethnic musical ensembles marked the inaugural of the Art Olympiad---a national festival. Animated meetings symbolising Lenin's life-giving national policy and the unity of socialist 78 culture took place in theatres, at parks, clubs and in the streets.

Kon, who was never much of a dresser, had a new suit for the occasion and looked much younger than his years. From the stage he delivered a fiery speech: "This is a historic moment. As we meet here for our olympiad, bombs and guns are still the answer to the national question abroad. What we shall see here today is but the epitome of what is taking place throughout the entire Soviet Union. We are rediscovering our country. Lenin wrote: 'We have yet to learn of the proletariat's creative forces, but they will fully reveal themselves only after the overthrow of capitalist domination.' As I look upon all of you present here I picture to myself a great train of international coaches carrying passengers of various nationality.''

That was a period when the working masses, having overcome the ruins of war, yearned for the theatre, literature, music and the fine arts. It was a time when some ``Leftists'' used revolutionary words in an effort to divert the powerful course of socialist culture and to deprive it of its communist content; they renounced the cultural heritage of the past and in the guise of ``novelty'' smuggled in formalism in art and literature devoid of principles and ideals.

Kon firmly implemented Lenin's policy by striving to acquaint the broad masses with the great cultural heritage of the past and to bring contemporary art closer to life and make it more fully reflect the interests, aims and hopes of the people, and bring them happiness and strengthen their faith in the victory of communist ideas.

Despite his great age, Kon travelled across the country, and it was his idea that Moscow theatre companies and musical ensembles should go out to the construction sites of the First Five-Year Plan period. Mobile art exhibitions displaying the best works went to towns in the Urals, 79 Siberia and Kazakhstan. Many theatres, studios, Sunday conservatoires and art schools were opened locally.

Lenin said:

``A cultural problem cannot be solved as quickly as political and military problems. ... It is possible to obtain victory in war in a few months. But it is impossible to achieve a cultural victory in such a short time. By its very nature it requires a longer period; and we must adapt ourselves to this longer period, plan our work accordingly. . . .''

Kon realised this full well, and worked with dedication on the vast cultural front. In 1931, the Party appointed him to head the nation's radio broadcasting system and radio installation work. There again, guided by his concept of the spirit of Leninism, Kon did much to vivify a field that was, in fact, quite unfamiliar to him.

He told a correspondent of Radiofront magazine: "We are now directing all our efforts to acquaint the masses with the cultural treasures of the past, and seek to attract to broadcasting our most talented contemporaries in literature and music.''

Speaking to his fellow workers in the Radio Committee, Kon pointed out the boundless possibilities of radio as a mass medium which got through to an audience running into millions. "It's wonderful,'' he said, "but it's also a great responsibility.''

__*_*_*__

Time never stopped. Kon measured it in his own way, by the notches in his heart. He was in a Moscow suburb in 1941, when the war broke out, and the Central Committee summoned him urgently on June 22.

At 77 one is not much of a fighter, but Kon went to the front as editor of the Polish Radio Broadcasting Committee. This was a weapon tried and true: it boosted the morale of his friends, and hit out at the enemy. But 80 the strain proved too great, and like a soldier he died at his post.

Kon, a member of the Soviet Writers' Union, never claimed to be a man of letters, but his pen was a real bayonet.

He was an ethnographer and a historian, but never claimed to be a scientist. He was a leader in culture but regarded himself as a rank-and-file member of the great Party of Lenin, a soldier of the revolution, a loyal servant of the people, who gave his life for them.

Nikolai Strokovsky

6---2330

[81]

A MEETING THAT NEVER TOOK PLACE

[82] 099-13.jpg [83]

Lenin, May 1919

[84] __ALPHA_LVL1__ A MEETING THAT NEVER TOOK PLACE

I have no greater desire than to continue, together with thousands of other enthusiasts, the job of renewing the earth, as the great Lenin urged us to do.

Ivan Michurin

1

``The job of renewing the earth" was a favourite expression of Ivan Michurin, and it occurs again and again in his basic works and in the hundreds of letters, greetings, reports and telegrams that he sent out and received.

The great selectionist had a really hard---not to say terrible---life, waging a humiliating and hopeless campaign to break through the sticky web of bureaucratic red tape. In the long years of heroic and zealous endeavour, Michurin created dozens of new---high-yielding, frost-resistant, unpretentious and delicious---varieties of apples, pears, cherries, apricots and berries. But he could do nothing to carry these fantastic achievements beyond the confines of his native town of Kozlov.

The authorities, the Church and the official scientific circles maintained that all things were immutable and had been created by God. It was assumed that only trouble-makers and revolutionaries tried to alter the established order of things. Michurin's apples and pears 85 could be seen, felt and tasted, but their existence could not be recognised. It was easier to turn a blind eye on them than to acknowledge that man had dared interfere with God's ``divine'' works. What Michurin was doing looked very much like "undermining the established".

He himself strove to speak to the nation, but had no chance. He was not invited to any of the official conferences, and no books---not so much as a pamphlet---were published before the Revolution about his methods.

Michurin then started issuing annual price lists of all his varieties of fruit. They were printed on cheap paper, and went to official institutions, apple vendors, train guards and anyone who came to Kozlov.

He had travelled much, and had seen extreme want and poverty. Now he held and offered the key to abundance, wealth and glory, but met with indifference and even mockery. Horticulturists simply refused to believe that what Michurin had done was possible.

In the course of his anxious and futile efforts over the decades to pass his knowledge on to the Russian peasants, Michurin acquired a strong hatred for the authorities who threw up the wall that blocked his way and spoiled his life.

A few faded pages remain of his 1869 diary. Michurin, then thirteen, kept a record of the weather and the flowering of fruit-trees and their yields. Every line spoke of the boy's keen and slightly ridiculous eagerness instantly to tackle the elements in an organised manner. It would be ridiculous, indeed, but for his subsequent achievements.

At the age of sixty, it is natural to sum up your life. On the eve of his sixtieth birthday, in 1914, Michurin published a small and very sad item in the journal Sadovodstvo (Gardening) under the rather unusual 86 heading: "Some General Autobiographical Information for a Portrait''. On the photograph that appeared with the article was a thin man, with a small beard and a long moustache, wearing a strict frock-coat. Not only his eyes, keen, strict and somewhat tired, but also the quite noticeable wrinkles across the bridge of his nose, his defensive pose, and the wary poise of his head, all spoke of long struggle and high tension. One's 099-14.jpg I. Michurin first impression was that the man, if not already broken in spirit, was pretty close to it. What Michurin said in his article seemed only to substantiate such a conclusion: "I made tens of thousands of experiments. I grew a vast amount of new varieties of fruit-bearing plants.... I worked the best I could on the means which I obtained by my own labour. Throughout the past period I constantly struggled against poverty and endured all kinds of hardships silently; I never asked for assistance from the government so that I might more extensively develop this work, so highly useful and so very necessary to Russian agriculture. "On the advice of eminent horticulturists, I submitted 87 several memoranda to our department of agriculture in which I tried to explain the vast importance and the necessity of improving and increasing native varieties of fruit-bearing plants by raising local varieties from seeds. Nothing came of these memoranda. And now, at last, it is too late---the years have gone by and my strength is exhausted.''

A look at the photograph makes one wonder: Is it possible that the man is sixty? You could give him 47 or 50 at the most! You take a closer look and realise that the man is not broken at all, that after all, as the saying later went, there are still "inexhaustible reserves" of energy in him. The man had a will of iron.

Michurin could lash himself into a fury of sarcastic indignation, but he never complained. Fate was hard on him, and visited him almost daily with some new calamity.

There was irony in the very fact that he, a weak offspring of an impoverished Ryazan landowner, should spurn an armchair vocation and opt for one which required hard manual work. Poor as Miehurin's family was, it was nevertheless also proud and obstinate. It bowed to none. The future selectionist grew up an upright man with an unbending character. His father's death and complete ruin merely served to sharpen his sense of independence and need to stand up for his human dignity. His ego took many knocks from early childhood. After a short while at school, he was expelled for "failure to show respect to his seniors".

Then followed years of monotonous and stupefying office work, poverty and pathetic efforts to keep a family on 12 rubles a month. At the cost of incredible privation he managed to lease a small plot of land for his first orchard. He was still years away from his idea of renewing the earth, but he already felt an overpowering attraction to gardening. With his wife, her sister and niece Michurin worked hard every day, and well past midnight. He carries on his work at the office, repairs watches and 88 various appliances at home, but devotes his best time to gardening. His diary of this first decade is evidence of tremendous and complete dedication to the idea that held him. He arrived at the conclusion that many plants in their natural state bring far less benefit than they could. They should be improved, and endowed with useful properties, while their negative ones should be destroyed.

Gardening becomes Michurin's obsession; he is by now so absorbed in it that he hardly takes notice of anything else. His enthusiasm is contagious: everyone who comes into contact with him---especially his family---live by plans alone. There are more than 600 different plants on his small plot, but they are so crowded that many are stifled and begin to die. His appeals for help meet with nothing but irony. Michurin has not the heart to destroy any of his experimental plants, and decides on measures which are recorded in his diary: "Plant between the trees and along the fence. With seven inches per plant, they should last for three years.''

And for three years his family live on a salty soup of bread and onions, in addition to the vegetables they grow, and two kopeks' worth of tea a brew. But he always got a bigger plot of land---when he could, either on time or by selling everything he could spare. In one case, there was no money left to hire a cart, and so Michurin and his family carried their plants on their backs over a distance of some seven kilometres.

For two years the family lived in a hut, having sold their house to buy more land. But in five years' time it became another splendid and unsurpassed orchard, full of trees bearing fruits to be found nowhere else in the world.

Meanwhile, the country remains oblivious of this, and the authorities do not care about Michurin's magic orchards. Neither the man nor his works quite fit into official science or the table of ranks. And so there is a conspiracy of silence.

For the fourth time, Michurin had to move his nursery 89 garden to another place, once again, of course, with his own hands. In the process, a considerable part of his treasured collection, the only one of its kind in the world, was lost, and for a time he seemed to be on the verge of total despair. But he roused himself and carried on, even when the high water in the spring of 1915 flooded his nursery and the ice of the turbulent river nearly buried all his precious two-year hybrids. He found the strength to carry on even when he lost his best friend and assistant: his wife, Alexandra, died in the cholera epidemic that summer.

Michurin turned 62 in 1917.

In Russia, only a few dozen people knew about him, by then his bold experiments had already been recognised abroad. In 1898, the Canadian Farmers' Conference, meeting after a severe winter, stated that with the exception of Michurin's cherry, which he called ``Fertile'', all the others, European and American, had been killed by the frost. "This seems to be the best cherry in the world as regards its frost-resisting properties,'' the farmers wrote to Michurin. "We hope you will keep us informed about your further successes and discoveries.''

The enterprising Americans also showed appreciation of Michurin's new varieties of berries and fruits, and many came to Kozlov for a thorough study of his nursery. In 1913, Michurin received an official offer from the U.S. Government to sell his entire collection of plants---lock, stock and barrel---and to leave his ungrateful country and go to work in the New World.

This was a tantalising proposal. It said:

``In order to stage your experiments, which are to be conducted entirely at your own discretion, you will be allotted extensive plantations within any specified latitudes. These plantations will be equipped with whatever type of laboratories you may deem necessary. You will have at your command as many assistants, scientists and other personnel as the scale of work may demand. To 90 effect the crossing to America you will be provided with a whole ship. From Russia you will be able to transport all your plants, property and whatever else you may find desirable. To enhance your work you will be provided with various seeds from all the corners of the globe. You will receive a personal salary of 8,000 dollars a year. . ..''

But Michurin did not go to America. Harsh as his life was in Russia, he stayed: he was a true son of his people and believed in their bright future.

``I have many reasons to decline your offer,'' he wrote in reply, "but the principal one is this: I have known for a long time that a mere transplantation of plants from one country to another does not give the desired results of acclimatisation. I presume that this also applies to people.''

Following his somewhat curt dismissal of the American scouts, Michurin railed at the Russian authorities, criticised the official scientists, fought the bureaucratic sleepy-heads, and was close to despair. By October 1917, Michurin's nursery contained about 800 different plants, which included varieties from the U.S.A., Canada, Japan, China, India, Indonesia, France, Britain, Central Asia, Tibet, Pamir, the Caucasus, the Balkans, the Alps, the Crimea, the tundra, etc. He had developed 45 new varieties of apples, 20 pears, 13 cherries and 15 plums, a total of more than 150 absolutely new varieties of fruit and berries.

But all this was confined to Kozlov, a tiny spot on the map of Russia. In order somehow to attract the attention of the Agricultural Department, Michurin issues desperate and naive appeals, such as that "from a small urban estate at the western end of the Ukrainskaya Street (in Kozlov), House 120, Mrs. M. N. Davidova collects a crop from her 63 frost-resistant Bere pear trees (cultivated by Michurin) which nets her up to 3,000 rubles a year".

There is a ring about this not just of anguish but of downright despair.

91

2

Michurin met his first Bolshevik in the summer of 1905. Late one evening, he discovered a man in his garden who was wet and tattered and appeared to have just swum across the Lesnoi Voronezh.

``Who are you?" Michurin inquired sharply.

The stranger came forward, studying Michurin, and suddenly flashed a smile:

``Will you take me on as a worker?''

The stranger had a pleasing personality, but Michurin grumpily repeated his question emphasising it with a tap of his stick.

``Do you mind if I don't answer?" the man asked somewhat furtively, but later said his name was Perelogin.

Michurin looked at him with understanding. In the period of mass arrests and shootings that followed the defeat of the revolution, many sought refuge where they could.

That was how the worker Desenchuk, a Bolshevik, came to stay with Michurin. The gendarmes got wind of his whereabouts and raided the nursery at odd hours in an effort to track him down, but Michurin always managed to hide him.

It is a pity that the talks with Desenchuk had little influence on him. Michurin wholeheartedly wished the revolution victory but his own failures and disappointments over the decades had turned him into a skeptic.

It is quite likely that in their talks Desenchuk may have mentioned Lenin's name. However, Michurin never did meet Lenin, not even after Lenin heard about his work. Nothing at all is known of any correspondence between them. And yet although they never met personally, they did meet vicariously.

Kozlov was a typical provincial small town. It was ruled by money and rank, and its customs were antediluvian. Its merchants and storekeepers met the October 92 Revolution apprehensively. At first, power in Kozlov was seized by the Socialist-Revolutionaries, but then came the Bolsheviks.

All through the night Michurin paced the floor of his room. He would stop to write down in his diary: "I will work for the people.'' He kept mumbling to himself: "I must join them! My hands are just as toil-hardened as theirs. They want a new world, and so do I----"

The uyezd Soviet had just taken over power in Kozlov but there was still some shooting in the streets. At first, the Bolsheviks on the uyezd Committee could not understand what the lean old man, with sparkling eyes, whom many of them knew, wanted. Michurin had come in the very first hours after the take-over and declared, "I want to work for the new power.''

For him this was the most natural thing to do.

Probably no other eminent scientist had such a deeprooted and conscious hatred for tsarism and capitalism as Michurin did. For it was they, "the powers that be'', as he was wont contemptuously to refer to the former rulers, who had confined his dream of transforming nature to a small patch of soil, and had prevented him from sharing his discovery with the people. "The power of the working people" were words which gave Michurin a feeling of confidence for his was a temperament which detested idlers and had a deep respect for the working people.

There were many people, however, who thought that the revolution spelled out only destruction.

Despite the inevitable destruction of the first few days Michurin saw the revolution as something quite different. He saw the creative element in it, the possibilities it opened up for creative work. Nor was he afraid of destruction, for he saw that what was being broken down was but the wall that had been separating him and his discoveries from the Russian peasants.

93

There is much food for thought in the fact that Michurin, whom life itself had taught to distrust and hate any representative of the authorities, and who had resolutely refused to subordinate himself to the Department of Agriculture, did not just go but hastened to offer the Soviet power his services. It showed how long he had struggled desperately and in vain; it spoke of his passionate impatience and of his new implicit faith. Lenin wrote that Russia had achieved her revolution through much suffering. Michurin was as Russian as could be, and he too had suffered with his country for the right to engage in creative labour.

In the first few hours, Michurin generously offered the Kozlov revolutionary committee his own services, his knowledge and all his precious collection of new plants over which he had toiled for forty years. Michurin had never sought to profit from his nursery; he and his family had always lived a very frugal life saving every kopek to promote their experiments. He had lived from hand to mouth and had deprived his family of the bare necessities; it pained him to do so, but he suffered even more at the thought that all of this was in vain, and that for all his sacrifices his country was not having the benefit of the miracle he had nursed.

But Michurin's hopes in the new life were justified. In 1918 the People's Commissariat for Agriculture not only placed Michurin's nursery under state sponsorship but made him in charge of it and gave it his name. Within a year, its territory was extended to include the lands of the former Troitsky Monastery.

Already in those difficult war years, when it still seemed too early to contemplate peaceful endeavour, the formidable wall that had once separated Michurin from his people collapsed. Russia came to him. Thousands of peasants from the early collective and state farms made their way into his fruit crop nursery, to see for themselves.

94

In the famine year of 1921, the Soviet authorities in Kozlov organised an exhibition of Michurin's achievements. This was a bold and highly vital idea: apples, pears, plums and grapes were displayed to show the people what they could and would reap from their soil in the new and free world.

In his recollections of Lenin, Gorky tells of Lenin's meeting with members of the Academy of Science: " Having seen off the scientists, Lenin said with satisfaction, 'Now, those are really clever people. Everything they say is formulated clearly and simply, and you can see at a glance that they know what they want. It is a pleasure to work with such men.' "

Lenin's views had a profound influence on Michurin, too. Lenin regarded science as one of the revolutionary elements that were indispensable for bringing about the transformation of the world.

Lenin, the leader of the first socialist state, looked far ahead into the future. He was firmly convinced that man could and should learn the innermost laws of nature so as to shape it to his needs.

This was precisely what Michurin, too, strove to achieve. When Lenin read about Michurin here and there, about his methods and principles, he realised that here was a revolutionary naturalist.

The care and attention given to Michurin and his nursery by the Council of People's Commissars and its Chairman, at a time when the state was beset with crucial problems, clearly testified to the great importance it attached to Michurin's work.

In 1920 I. F. Frantz, the head of Tambov Gubernia's Agricultural Department, came to Moscow to help the People's Commissariat for Agriculture draw up a report for Lenin. Quite unexpectedly for Frantz he was asked to report to Lenin on Michurin's work. All he had heard of, however, was that Michurin had developed a sweet 95 ashberry rowan, some large-sized cherries and delicious pears.

Lenin was impressed even by this incomplete account, and ordered a delegation of specialists to go to Kozlov. It appears, however, that at the time there were bureaucrats and pseudo-scientists at the People's Commissariat for Agriculture. Michurin did not remember who came to see him from Moscow, but they were people who spoke rather haughtily and with an obvious sense of superiority and gave Michurin very little attention. Upon their return to Moscow these bureaucratic ignoramuses submitted a report which said Michurin was a self-styled obstinate pseudo-scientist who "dreamed of growing pears on willow branches".

Once again Michurin's valuable work might have become shrouded in oblivion for a long time, but for Lenin's remarkable memory. When he met I. F. Frantz again, he instantly recalled and inquired about Michurin.

Frantz wrote: "Lenin reproached me for not showing enough perseverance, as a Bolshevik, in this matter, and there and then gave strict instructions to Teodorovich (the then People's Commissar for Agriculture) to get hold of all of the reports and other pertinent information about Michurin and urgently to let him personally have it all. Lenin emphasised the word 'personally'.''

Some interesting light on this episode is thrown by N. P. Gorbunov, business secretary of the Council of People's Commissars. He was abroad in the summer of 1922 when he received Lenin's instructions to collect all information on a book by Professor Harwood, entitled The New Earth, which described the latest achievements of agriculture in America.

``Later, when I returned to Moscow,'' Gorbunov recalled, "Lenin, who by then was already bed-ridden, repeatedly returned to the question of rejuvenating the soil and deplored our narrow-mindedness and red tape which tended to retard any initiative and hindered progress.''

96

``I don't see any efforts being made on our part to vitalise the soil,'' Lenin said. "Please find out how many cars of improved seeds we have imported from abroad.''

Lenin inquired with great interest about the work of Michurin, referring to him as "our home-grown self-taught Luther Burbank who was achieving wonders in his nursery in Kozlov in Tambov Gubernia".

For Michurin, 1922 was a turning point. On November 18 the Tambov Gubernia Executive Committee received the following telegram from Moscow: "Experimental breeding of new plants is of tremendous state importance. Urgently report on the work and results in this field of Michurin of Kozlov district for a report to Lenin, Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars. Confirm receipt of telegram.''

Michurin wrote his report, and although it was not addressed to Lenin but to I. F. Frantz, head of the Tambov Gubernia's Agricultural Department, any unbiassed reading of the report shows to whom the scientist addressed those lines. There is passion and reserve, insistence and demand, and even timidity. But always there are the vibrant hope and impatience, which Michurin felt since October 1917.

There is the fact that Michurin discussed the problem of plant cultivation for the whole of Russia, not just Tambov Gubernia. He urged the cultivation throughout the country of locally-grown varieties of fruit-bearing plants and criticised the practice of indiscriminate importation of agricultural produce from abroad, something which obviously could not apply to Tambov Gubernia, which had no foreign ties.

Michurin made the following note on his own manuscript copy of his report: "At the end of November 1922, the Tambov Agricultural Department attached a copy of this report to its own report to Comrade Lenin at the Council of People's Commissars in Moscow.''

At the same time Michurin sent Lenin some specimens 97 of his new fruits, which Lenin showed with delight to all his visitors.

Lenin, upon receipt of Michurin's report, wrote in his book of assignments: "December 4, performed by Michurin.'' That same day, he also entered an assignment for the People's Commissar for Agriculture to report to him on what had been done for Michurin's nursery. That month Lenin gave four reminders to the People's Commissariat for Agriculture of the importance of providing Michurin with everything he needed, and only after being satisfied that this had been done, did he make the entry in his notebook: "Done, December 26.''

In the summer of that year, Michurin had a visit from Mikhail Kalinin, the nation's elder statesman, and the scientist was deeply moved.

Michurin later wrote: "The war had hardly ended when my work attracted the attention of no other than Lenin of blessed memory. It was on his instructions in 1922 that my work was given unparalleled scope.''

Michurin had lived in Russia for 60 years, 40 of which had gone into the remarkable experiments and discoveries which made him famous in Europe and America, but not at home, where he remained unknown and apparently unwanted.

He wrote later: "Before the revolution, I used to be insulted again and again by the judgements of ignoramuses, who declared all my work to be useless, to be mere 'fancies' and 'nonsense'. The officials from the Department of Agriculture shouted at me, 'You dare not do it!' The official scientists declared my hybrids to be 'illegitimate'. The clergy threatened me, 'Don't commit blasphemy!...''

Lenin, of course, must have known of the visit paid to Michurin in Kozlov by Kalinin, Chairman of the AllUnion Central Executive Committee. Kalinin spoke at length with Michurin; he told him about Lenin and made a thorough inspection of the nursery. The letter he wrote 98 to Michurin from Moscow soon afterwards was full of heartfelt friendliness and good-natured humour. It said, "Dear Ivan Vladimirovich, I am sending you a small parcel as a reminder of myself. Please do not regard it as a token of official good will. It is simply an expression of my personal sympathy, respect and appreciation of your work.''

Michurin received an invitation to take part in the first All-Union Agricultural Exhibition opened in Moscow the following year. With a feeling of great joy he prepared to show his accomplishments to the nation and meet those for whom he had toiled all his life.

Michurin's wonderful seedlings, delicious fruits and berries greatly impressed everyone at the exhibition and brought him a well-earned reward. For his "valuable and extraordinary accomplishments in the field of experimental hybridisation in the course of 50 years of work in the development of new varieties of frost-resistant fruitbearing plants and vegetables for the central and northern areas of Russia'', the exhibition's commission of experts gave Michurin the highest award, a diploma of the Central Executive Committee of the U.S.S.R.

Soon afterwards a decree of the Council of People's Commissars of the R.S.F.S.R. turned Michurin's nursery into a state enterprise. It was noted that it had become one of the nation's leading research institutions. It received large subsidies and was provided with scientific equipment, more land and staff.

That is how Lenin discovered Michurin for the benefit of science and the people.

``Lenin! He has done more good in seven years than all the other great men of the world in a thousand. Compare and judge for yourself. Long live Lenin!''

These words belong to a workers' delegation and always come to mind when one recalls the affection and veneration with which Michurin pronounced the name of the great Lenin.

99 Emacs-File-stamp: "/home/ysverdlov/leninist.biz/en/1967/LOL318/20061230/199.tx" __EMAIL__ webmaster@leninist.biz __OCR__ ABBYY 6 Professional (2006.03.0) __WHERE_PAGE_NUMBERS__ bottom __FOOTNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [*]+ __ENDNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+

In the autumn of 1925, the country marked the 50th anniversary of Michurin's creative work.

Lenin was no more.

It was from this very period---as his works and various documents later clearly revealed---that the scientist ever more frequently wrote of Lenin's behest to rejuvenate the soil. Michurin clearly regarded the behest as being addressed to him personally.

In 1930, Michurin wrote a special letter to the 16th Communist Party Congress. He started it in his typical style which was rather unusual for such a document: "We must break with the past and cease living for our own sake only---something that unfortunately has become too deeply rooted in each of us. We must all work for the good of all and the consequent general improvement in the standard of living will afford better conditions to every one of us.'' At the end he came to the point: "The present mix-up of small intermittent patches of land cultivated by individual peasants will give place to uninterrupted wide fertile fields of kolkhozes engirdled with strips of orchards. Field-orchards will be thus created. . . .

``I find it essential to point to the necessity of organising experimental stations in every region that would work along the same lines as the Kozlov pomological experimental station.''

The following year, the Order of Lenin was conferred on Michurin for his outstanding contribution in developing new varieties of plants. In expressing his gratitude for this high honour, he started with the assurance that he would continue to work with still greater energy, towards the fulfilment of Lenin's behest of renewing the soil. He was 76 years, but had entered his second youth, which continued despite his physical age.

His native town, Kozlov, was renamed Michurinsk, and became a kind of headquarters with the famous motto: 100 ``We cannot wait for favours from Nature; we must wrest them from her.''

From spring till late autumn, hundreds of delegations, tens of thousands of collective-farm workers, students, agronomists and school children flock there from all over the Soviet Union.

Michurin played an active part in organising Soviet agriculture. He worked out plans for the development of gardening in the country, wrote books and articles, and urged agronomists to work towards the all-round development of plant and animal selection. He organised special state-sponsored expeditions in search of new plants, and only the Young Communist League expedition to the Far East taiga brought back almost 200 different specimens of seeds, cuttings and live plants. Michurin worked on increasing urban green-planting, notably in Baku, whose massive green foliage, now capable of withstanding the hot dry winds, dust storms and drought, is largely the result of the efforts of Michurin and his pupils. He tested the first varieties of the rubber tree, developed methods of grafting cork oak, and played a most active part in boosting the development of volatile oil plants, cotton, citrus fruits, rice and tea.

All this required a tremendous amount of time.

``Even a life-time,'' he used to say, "is too short to trace the results of an apple-tree through three generations.''

He was swamped with a flood of work, and only his rigid regimen enabled Michurin to cope with the splendid diversity of undertakings, each of which was important and indispensable for Russia. Michurin had to hurry.

He devoted himself to making his theory truly popular and showing the mass of people how rich and effective it is.

In his remarkable article entitled "The present and the future of the natural sciences in the work of the 101 collective and state farms'', Michurin summarised the first results obtained through a union of science and practice. He cited carefully collected facts of the farmers' creative initiative, and of the valuable work done by the selectionist groups, and the laboratories. He showed that the state and collective farms already had thousands of excellent experimenters working on a scientific basis.

``This phenomenon is colossal in scope and significance,'' he wrote. "I can see that the system of collective farming, through which the Communist Party is beginning to implement the great task of renewing the soil, will bring working humanity to a great triumph over the forces of nature.... There is a great future for our natural science on the collective and state farms.''

Alexei Musatov, Mikhail Lyashenko

[102] ~ [103]

THE VISIONARY FROM KALUGA

[104] 199-1.jpg [105]

Lenin In Us Kremlin study, October 1918

[106] __ALPHA_LVL1__ THE VISIONARY FROM KALUGA

We all cherish the name of K. E. Tsiolkovsky and his remarkable works. It was he who blazed the trail into outer space.

V. Bykovsky, Cosmonaut of the U.S.S.R.

A three-edged obelisk soars into Moscow's sky like a shaft of light. Crowning this remarkable monument to the courage of the Soviet men who blazed the path into space is a rocket with a flash of blue lightning on its steel body. At the foot of it stands the bronze sculpture of Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, inventor and scientist, in deep thought of the future.

His face is a study in wisdom, kindness, fortitude and determination. This bronze figure of him resembles his real self, as I remember him when I met him many years ago. He is the same, but not quite. There is some new trait there that I do not remember seeing in life or on any of his photographs. "What is it?" I wonder.

The throbbing rhythm of life around suggests the answer: it is an expression of happiness and pride that seem to prompt the answer, that radiate from the face of our great compatriot.

Tsiolkovsky realised his greatest dream and made his most important discovery just when the Communist Party was born in Russia. The Second Congress of the R.S.D.L.P. was held in 1903. Lenin set the only right path for the revolutionary movement and led the Bolsheviks along it. That same year, Tsiolkovsky made public his discovery 107 of the only realistic technical principle for interplanetary space flight.

Rockets were not new. The British colonialists used rockets against the Indian patriots in the early eighteenth century. The Russian army under Alexander II had special rocket-artillery units. At the end of the last century, Nikolai Kibalchich, a revolutionary and a member of the People's Will group, while awaiting execution in the dark cell of the Peter and Paul Fortress for an attempt on the tsar's life, thought of how to give man wings. He designed a rocket-propelled airship. His solution may have been primitive, but his reasoning was sound.

Another of Tsiolkovsky's predecessors, the inventor A. P. Fyodorov, went farther. He stated definitely that it was possible to build a flying machine which would move without air support---as birds and dirigibles do---but in a vacuum. He proposed a propelling agent based on jet propulsion, the force generated inside the machine itself as a reaction to the jet emitted.

Tsiolkovsky's biographers have established that he learned about Kibalchich's ideas decades after he had produced the scientific answer to space flight. But he knew of Fyodorov's ideas as he worked on the problem, and they may have acted like the apple in Newton's case.

After an effort of many years, Tsiolkovsky discovered and gave mathematical proof of the fact that only a jetpropelled rocket could fly both in the earth's atmosphere and beyond it. A revolutionary in science, he established that a rocket, given the necessary motor power and velocity of the escaping hot gases, could develop a speed that would allow it to go into orbit round the earth, and to overcome the earth's pull and escape into outer space, when both power and velocity were increased. He backed up his theoretical proof with highly ingenious diagrams of rocket spaceships, on whose principles all modern space vehicles are based.

It is, of course, only a coincidence, that in one and the 108 same year Lenin created the new type of party destined by history to lead humanity to communism, while Tsiolkovsky laid the foundations of a new branch of science, which opened before man boundless possibilities for development and migration in space. But it was no coincidence that their strivings and thoughts were so very much akin.

199-2.jpg K. Tsiolkovsky

A great love of men and an overpowering sense of responsibility to them were the noble incentive behind Lenin's genius. It was the same with Tsiolkovsky, although his efforts went into a different sphere.

Karl Marx's laws of social development have shown that society must change. Lenin dedicated himself to the cause of the socialist revolution to hasten man's liberation from the fetters of capitalism. What Lenin wanted was to give man every possibility for a free and a radiant life.

With all his being, Tsiolkovsky, too, strove to help man to acquire "bread in abundance and infinite might'', as he put it. His works, showing man how to overcome the earth's gravitational pull, opened unlimited possibilities for penetration into outer space.

Tsiolkovsky tackled and gave a theoretical solution to a titanic problem, but his path was neither smooth nor straight.

His life was a hard one, and in the course of his long quest over the decades he faced a succession of seemingly insurmountable obstacles.

Let us go back to old Kaluga, a quiet little town. The narrow Korovinskaya Street, overgrown with grass, winds its way down to the Oka's floodlands. The bluish hills 109 on the Oka's right bank stand out against the horizon. The Volga's "elder daughter" seems to slumber peacefully. Everything is also quiet on Kaluga's outskirts, which are equally desolate in summer and winter.

The last house in Korovinskaya Street is small and old, and has settled to one side. There are three small windows and a large one at the top.

Every morning, at the same hour, a tall elderly man wearing a dark cloak and hat leaves the little house and walks up the street with a surprisingly brisk step. He has dark eyes, wears a beard and has something of a stoop. He turns a corner and makes his way to the school. Few people stop to greet him; some look at him with sympathy, others with derision. Tsiolkovsky is a familiar figure in Kaluga. He is known as a fine teacher who, although he is almost completely deaf, can explain to his pupils the fundamentals of mathematics in a very interesting manner and show them some curious experiments in physics. But the people of Kaluga regard him as an eccentric, a man who is "out of touch" and openly laugh at his strange preoccupations in his attic, where the green lamp burns late into the night, and there is the purring of a lathe and the clang of hammered iron. "Making wings for himself!" the people say. On clear moonlit nights, his neighbours get a glimpse of him on the roof of his lean-to and say, "Trying to catch a star!''

Indeed, Tsiolkovsky worked nights to give men powerful wings, and boldly reached for the stars! He worked tirelessly and with abandon, but he was all alone.

He was stricken with deafness as a child and this tended to estrange him from his fellows and prevented him from going to school. He went through the course himself, virtually without help. His father sent him to Moscow to prepare for an examination to qualify as a teacher of mathematics in a secondary school. Young Tsiolkovsky lived on bread and potatoes and sat over his books for up to 20 hours a day.

110

``I consumed all my reserves of fat, and nearly died of exhaustion,'' he recalled later.

He became a teacher in Borovsk, and later in Kaluga, but did not acquire many friends. He was always busy working on his inventions and building models of allmetal dirigibles. He drew diagrams of jet-propelled flying machines and staged thousands of experiments to study the effect of air pressure on moving bodies. He invented and built the various instruments he needed. He strove to make the most of every hour, and usually denied himself even a short rest. Only on Sundays and during the summer holidays he would cycle down to the floodlands and towards the Oka's tributary, the Yachenka, which led to the woodlands beyond the river. Sometimes he would indulge himself in an hour or two of brass band music in the Zagorodny Park. The ``eccentric'' was conspicuous as he stood close to the band-stand, away from the crowded lanes; only by standing very close to the orchestra could he hear what was being played.

Tsiolkovsky's loneliness, however, was not only the result of his deafness or passionate interest in his creative work. At the turn of the century he had made several attempts to collaborate with the country's scientific institutions, among them the Imperial Academy of Sciences and the Society of Natural Scientists.

Occasionally some outstanding Russian scientists, such as Sechenov, Stoletov, Rykachev and Mendeleyev, showed the provincial teacher from Kaluga a little attention. But let us be frank: it never amounted to much. Just a few polite letters, and once a grant of 380 rubles for airresistance tests on which Tsiolkovsky worked hard for many months.

No, the truth is that nothing was done to help "the selfmade scientist" even by his progressive compatriots.

Nor was his work acknowledged by the press, except for an article here and there. Our thanks are probably due only to M. Filippov, the editor and publisher of the 111 Scientific Review, for publishing Tsiolkovsky's basic work, Jet-Propulsion in the Study of Cosmic Space. This proves that Russia was the first to start the conquest of space. The publication of this work gave Tsiolkovsky a moral incentive to carry on with his great scientific research. But few people paid any attention to the article, and for decades his life's work was shrouded in oblivion.

Nevertheless, Tsiolkovsky was sure that his inventions and discoveries were important. He knew that they were a step forward in science and technology. He was convinced that he was on the right track, and that his work would bring benefit to mankind. That is what made it so hard for this remarkable man to bear the torture of estrangement, silence and indifference.

Many men in his shoes would have given up the struggle, which seemed like a total waste of energy. But the ``eccentric'' teacher from Kaluga was firm, and never let a day pass without working on his projects and theoretical calculations.

You find signs of bitter anguish in his articles and personal notes. He wrote of the tragedy of pioneers in science, and of the difficulty of overcoming the inertia of ``academics'', and the cold indifference of society.

Of course, Tsiolkovsky was not the ``cheerful'' type given to unrestrained and groundless optimism, and he often suffered terribly from the fact that all his efforts failed to gain recognition. So much the more is he to be respected for his firmness of spirit and loyalty to science and humanistic ideals.

It would, however, be untrue to say that he had no close friends at all. There was his family, and his loving wife Varvara, who selflessly surmounted all privations; he had several close friends, progressive local intellectuals. These were his friends of long standing: tax inspector Vasily Assonov and his sons---Alexander, an engineer, and Vladimir, a geologist---and Kanning, the chemist. Another friend whose boldness of thought and loyalty to 112 science was almost equal to his own, was the well-known popular-science writer Yakov Perelman. But there were very few such men in Kaluga, Moscow or St. Petersburg.

This handful of well-wishers would not apparently have succeeded in heading off the -crisis that had been building up in the scientist's mind as he grew older, but for one happy development.

__*_*_*__

I had the good fortune of meeting Tsiolkovsky for the first time in the early thirties.

The same grass-covered Korovinskaya Street led down into Oka's valley. The same little three-windowed wooden house was still the last .in the street. As I came to the wicket-gate I noticed that the boards had grown shaggy and grey with time.

I felt somewhat uneasy as I knocked at the wicket-gate. I knew from the Assonovs that Tsiolkovsky hardly ever went visiting and himself very rarely invited anyone. And here I had come without any special invitation, just on the strength of a polite answer to my letter saying that I was welcome to call if I ever came to Kaluga and found the time.

It was quite a long time before I heard the sound of footsteps and the squeaking of the floor-boards. The gate was opened by Tsiolkovsky himself. He looked so different from the snapshots I had seen of him taken at the start of the century. The stoop was more pronounced, his hair was quite grey, his thinly-bearded face looked tired. Only his dark eyes were still young and keen as he looked at me and asked:

``Who do you want? Tsiolkovsky? Will you come in then?" Taking a step back, he added, "Please, don't say anything now, for I can't hear you anyway. Come up to my room, please, this way, up the stairs.''

We passed along a short corridor with windows looking out into a little garden full of asters, gillyflowers and __PRINTERS_P_113_COMMENT__ 8---2330 113 tobacco plants in bloom. Several stacks of small brochures were lying on the window sill.

Tsiolkovsky took a copy from each stack and handed them to me saying, "Will you take this, by way of introduction.''

They were his works: Genius and Grief, Rocket Trains, The Monism of the Universe, The Cause of the Cosmos, Mankind's Alphabet, Language and Orthography, The Earth's Past, Brain and Heart, The Contemporary State of the Earth, The Jet Aeroplane, and Dirigibles.

The stairway led up to a narrow covered terrace in the attic of the little house. Along the windows looking out on the flat roof of the lean-to were models of dirigibles made of corrugated metal, three-dimensional models of bodies for wind-tunnel studies, a small lathe, sheets of cardboard and tin, welding lamps and various other tools.

``I hope you will pardon the disorder, this is my experimental workshop. Come this way, please, to my working cabinet----"

I entered a little room, which is so familiar today to the many people who have seen it on photographs in numerous books and journals.

The room had a modest and rather austere air about it. To the left of the door stood a narrow Army cot covered with a grey blanket; near the windows to the right was a small writing desk; on it was a kerosene lamp with an oval-shaped green shade, stacks of manuscripts, books, pencils in a little glass and a large megaphone. Next to the writing desk was a padded armchair with a rounded back. On the wall hung a barometer. A bookshelf full of folders and books, and two Viennese chairs. There was also a large model of a dirigible.

Tsiolkovsky beckoned me into a seat; he sat down next to me in the armchair and reached out for the megaphone, which he applied to his ear.

``Now we can talk. I made this hearing device myself,'' he said, running his fingers through his beard and then 114 adding with a smile, "but perhaps you are hungry after your trip?''

``No, thank you very much,'' I answered. "Not at all.''

``What has brought you out here, to an old man?" he asked.

I told him that I was a writer, on the staff of an aviation research institute, and wanted to hear his views on the future of man's conquest of space, then a popular topic in aviation circles.

I said that screw-driven planes were already "on their feet" and that their future was in general quite clear: greater engine power, lighter weight and improved aerodynamic qualities would help to increase speed, range, lift capacity, altitude and safety. This would make planes more important in the military field and as a fast means of transport. Other branches of aviation would develop to aid agriculture, geology and weather-- forecasting. In the early thirties more than twenty planes were already being used in the U.S.S.R. to combat locusts and various other pests; plants were sprinkled from the air with powdered toxic chemicals. Planes were used for aerial photography, and experiments staged in fighting forest fires and making forest valuation.

Dirigibles were said to have a great future, despite the unfortunate flights by Nobile and Amundsen to the North Pole. Groups of designers in Russia and abroad were working on new types. A dirigible with a variable body volume, made of fibrous metal, invented by Tsiolkovsky at the end of the last century, was about to be tested.

Led and organised by engineer Tsander, a group of scientists, studying jet-propulsion, was enthusiastically working out a theory of rockets and jet-propelled aircraft; they were largely guided by Tsiolkovsky's discoveries and inventions. Engineer Tikhonravov and his group were making the first liquid-fuel rockets.

Many scientists began to study the upper layers of the atmosphere, for it was becoming clear that high speeds __PRINTERS_P_115_COMMENT__ 8* 115 could be attained only in the stratosphere, where air density, and consequently resistance was lower. Professor Molchanov of Leningrad developed a special automatic device, the radiosonde, for high-altitude probes.

Pursuing the same aim, the Belgian Professor Picard invented an aerostat-stratostat.-

Having heard me out, Tsiolkovsky nodded:

``Very well, I shall try to answer you,'' he said, and fell to thinking, as he gazed through the window at the slender-winged swallows sweeping up and down in the sky.

``On earth man will apparently never be able to fly over forests and fields like a bird,'' he began, as if talking to himself. "He can only do that in his sleep. Have you ever experienced the sensation of free flight in sleep?" he asked, and then went on: "That's when you feel that you are floating through weightlessness. Man will be able to fly freely only when he steps out of his cosmic ship in interplanetary space, in a special suit, of course. But in the air, near the earth, he will always need some mechanical aid in place of the bird's muscles. Much has been achieved in this respect already. I rejoice at the successes of aviation, it has a great future before it. However, screwdriven planes have limited possibilities. You see why? You do? Good. Then you will agree with me. I have long discovered the use of jet-propulsion for interplanetary space flights.'' He raised his hand and not so much said as dictated the following: "The age of screw-driven planes will be followed by one of jet-propelled planes.'' He paused till I had written that down in my notebook, and then asked, "When do you think that will be?" And gave the answer himself firmly and confidently, "In the twentieth century!" As if to back up his answer, he rose, went to his writing desk, and took up a folder.

``This is the typescript of my new work, 'The Semi-Jet Stratoplane'. That is how I called a plane which---to put it simply---will get its thrust from both screw and jet. I 116 hope this work will help people build an intermediate type of plane for high altitudes.''

He fell silent once again and looked out through the window at the flying swallows and the distant bluish haze beyond the Oka. As I looked at his tired but radiant face, I marvelled at this man's indomitable spirit. He must have gone through a great deal, but still found the strength to carry on the struggle for his ideas, while his powerful brain produced new projects and technical solutions.

This typescript, and the handful of booklets in my lap were vivid proof of his remarkable capacity for work and---at seventy-five.

I noticed there was no indication of price on many of the booklets, and asked him why. He laughed heartily,

``That's my whim! You see, I believe that human thought is the most valuable thing. It is priceless! In future, I'm sure, books---which are but repositories of thought---will be free. In future. . . . But there I go again, please forgive an old man. I'm always running ahead, in fact, have been all my life. That is why I publish many of my works myself, and give them away to anyone who is interested.''

He laughed merrily again, but soon became serious, and asked:

``Have you ever seen Lenin?''

``I'm afraid not.''

``He was a great man, a truly great man!''

Tsiolkovsky waved a hand in great excitement.

``Lenin was a friend of all inventors. He helped me too, and very much, but I never did get the opportunity to thank him personally.''

Tsiolkovsky never met Lenin, the great leader of the October Revolution. No facts have yet been discovered about whether Lenin had known of Tsiolkovsky's works or had ever said anything about him. I personally think there is no doubt about it at all.

Tsander, the engineer who started to work on jetpropulsion on the basis of Tsiolkovsky's ideas, must have 117 met and spoken to Lenin. And he must have told Lenin the name of his teacher and "foster father".

I also think that it may have been such an interview with Lenin that had inspired Tsander to organise "a society for the study of interplanetary communications" at the Academy of Aviation, where he then worked. This society was the first body of its kind in the world, and brought together men resolved to elaborate Tsiolkovsky's ideas. Tsiolkovsky was naturally elected a member, and so was also, and with good reason, another fine man, Felix Dzerzhinsky, an associate of Lenin's and a great-hearted political leader who looked entirely to the future.

This society subsequently provided the basic personnel for the first scientific organisation for the study of jetpropulsion, which was established on Tsander's initiative in the Society for the Promotion of Aviation and Chemical Defence.

That was a difficult period for the young Soviet state. It was poor and could not give the scientists and inventors a great deal.

Nevertheless, the workers' and peasants' state tried hard to provide the scientists with everything they needed. A commission was set up to help improve their living conditions. Academicians were given special rations, and the elderly received higher pensions. Tsiolkovsky had a double academic ration, and was awarded a special pension under a decree of the Council of People's Commissars, November 9, 1921, which read: "In view of his outstanding contribution to science, in the field of aviation, K. E. Tsiolkovsky is to receive a life pension.'' The decree was signed by Lenin.

Since then, and for the first time in his life, Tsiolkovsky had no worries about providing for his family. He gave up his school-teaching job and devoted all his time to his favourite work. His sense of loneliness had gone three years earlier, for that once heavy fog of nonrecognition had since then been dispelled.

118

He was elected competitive-member of the Socialist Academy, and later of the Naturalists' Association. He was also elected an honorary member of the Kaluga Nature Society.

As the years passed, Tsiolkovsky's ideas won more and more followers, many of whom have since then made a great contribution to jet technology. His pupils, apart from Tsander, include such prominent Soviet scientists and designers as Tikhonravov, Glushko, Blokhintsev, Stechkin and Vetchinkin.

The house on Korovinskaya Street, renamed Jaures Street, was now a popular address. The once lonely scientist-innovator felt the affection of a great many people.

Tsiolkovsky was carried away by the historical transformation of society started by the Great October Socialist Revolution.

His life of hardships was beginning to tell; his sight was growing dim, and his mighty brain began to tire quicker. But his indomitable will seemed to be even stronger; he was deeply immersed in creative endeavour, elaborating his theories, preparing new editions of old works and producing a whole series of remarkable projects.

Tsiolkovsky's biographer, the engineer B. Vorobyov, has estimated that before the revolution the scientist wrote about fifty works, and three times as many after it.

``I'm afraid I never got the chance to thank Lenin personally,'' Tsiolkovsky said sadly. "He left us much too soon. But I have full faith in the people who are carrying on his work. I rejoice at our successes like a child.''

The blue of the distant prospect was darkening, the evening was drawing near.

Tsiolkovskaya called her husband from downstairs to say that dinner was ready. She apologised for the modest meal and asked me to join them. Throughout the meal he was silent and only on parting, said:

``If you are ever in Kaluga again, don't hesitate to call, 119 that is, if you weren't too bored with an old man,'' he added with a mischievous smile.

I left for home that night. On the train I paged through his books and was fascinated by Tsiolkovsky's powerful and audacious ideas; it made me think of man's future, and of the diverse scientific and technological problems which Tsiolkovsky had so boldly sought to solve since the revolution. His scope was vast, ranging from a new universal language to the cultivation of plants on satellite ``stations'' where spaceships restocked food and oxygen--- produced by plants from solar energy.

I was amazed by his idea of multi-stage rockets, or rocket trains as he called them. He contended that they would offer the most reliable way of accelerating spaceships to cosmic speeds. This brilliant idea has since been applied to modern multi-stage rockets. He had some very interesting ideas on the earth's past, and on the origin of the solar system, and suggested ingenious ways of obtaining water in deserts through atmospheric precipitation, and of cleansing the soil from insect-pests and microorganisms.

As I read his works, one after another, I did not then always understand their full depth and significance, and some of them even struck me as being fantastic. But that did not detract from my admiration of him, and actually gave me a sense of veneration for his vast range of interests. What a tremendous amount of thinking he had done, despite his age and failing health. Few men could match him in all of human history. How good it was that he had lived to see the birth of our new world, a world which met him with understanding and acclaim, and gave him new strength, and which, of course, would carry on his work!

In the autumn of 1932, the Soviet Union marked the 75th birthday of the ``patriarch'' of aviation and aeronautics. He was awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labour. Maxim Gorky cabled: "With deepest respect I congratulate you, Hero of Labour,"

120

That was a very apt name for Tsiolkovsky, scientist, inventor, visionary and propagandist of science.

I later met Tsiolkovsky on several occasions, the last time, in the autumn of 1934, when I called on him at his new home, which the Soviet Government had given him, on the same street now renamed Tsiolkovsky Street.

Our meeting was short and sad. He looked tired and ill. He was very pale and had dark rings under his eyes, which only now and then showed some of the old sparkle. He had cancer.

For about an hour we discussed the publication of his works and his autobiography. He told me that, if he was strong enough, he would soon complete his autobiography ---"a new and fuller text"---and send it on to me without fail. As I was leaving, he insisted on seeing me to the door. He said sadly:

``We shall probably never meet again. Let me know how things go with the publication of my works. Please, pass my warmest regards to everyone who remembers me....''

Tsiolkovsky did send me his autobiography. It was published in the journal Molodaya Gvardia, a month after his death on September 19, 1935.

His last work Aviation, Aeronautics and Rocketry in the 20th Century was published soon afterwards. He sent me the typescript of it with a short note in his own hand shortly before he was taken to hospital.

The will read: "All my works on aviation, rocketry and interplanetary communications I bequeath to the Bolshevik Party and the Soviet Government, the true leaders of human progress and culture. I am confident that they will successfully complete my work.''

Lenin's Bolshevik Party and the Soviet people have fulfilled Tsiolkovsky's last will. "I am by nature and temperament a revolutionary and a Communist,'' he used to say. And he was right.

Victor Sytin

[121]

LUNACHARSKY

[122] 199-3.jpg [123]

Lenin and Lunacharsky among friends, May 1920

[124] __ALPHA_LVL1__ LUNACHARSKY __NOTE__ Missing "1" subheading (only "2").

On that cold dark October night the huge Smolny building in Petrograd stood in a sea of light, an unusual sight at that late hour, but then the events that were taking place there were destined to go down in history. It was there that the new Soviet Government headed by Lenin was formed, and it was there, too, that it adopted its first decrees on land and peace.

Anatoly Lunacharsky was appointed People's Commissar for Education. He was already over forty, and a man of wide experience and revolutionary training. He once wrote this of himself: "I became a Social-Democrat at a very early age. I should say that I acquired a more or less Marxist revolutionary outlook at once. I became a revolutionary so long ago that I cannot even remember myself ever not being one.''

Lunacharsky was an agitator and organiser of revolutionary circles among young people since his school years. He knew all the tricks of the underground, and had been arrested, imprisoned and exiled, he had lived as a political emigre abroad.

In his difficult life of a revolutionary fighter there were many events, big and small, but one of them is outstanding.

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Lunacharsky was in Paris in 1904 and it was there that he first met Lenin and heard him speak in a small Paris hall.

Lenin had just given a lecture on the future of the Russian revolution. Lunacharsky had, of course, heard of Lenin as a publicist, as a man who knew how to reduce the most abstruse ideas to simple terms. Now he was listening to Lenin and saw the sparkle of his intelligent eyes looking straight at his audience. Lunacharsky was fascinated by the man's will, which filled his every word, the logic of his reasoning, and his skilful use of metaphor. Here, he realised, was a powerful orator who left an indelible impression.

He never forgot that Paris meeting. He would often recall how he and Lenin had gone to the studio of the famous Paris sculptor Aronson. When the sculptor caught sight of Lenin's head he went into raptures, and insisted on modelling him. He compared Lenin's head with that of the ancient Greek philosopher Socrates. Lunacharsky himself would add that Lenin had a forehead of the unique beauty and spirituality of the sage.

Later, in Geneva, Lunacharsky worked under Lenin and met him every day, and so came to know many of his other outstanding qualities; his amazing vitality gave him a consistently even temper and optimistic disposition which helped to overcome various difficulties and disagreements among the political emigres.

Many have written of the way Lenin laughed, considering it highly characteristic of his buoyancy. Lunacharsky, too, often recollected Lenin's contagious and almost childish laughter. It was so easy to make him laugh, but then his indignation was also just below the surface. Lunacharsky wrote: "I often noticed that superficial boiling pitch, those biting words and ironic shafts, while the twinkle of his eye was gone though somewhere near all the time; he was instantly capable of switching from the scene of wrath, which he seemed to be playing off 126 because it was necessary. All this time, deep inside, he stayed serene and even cheerful.''

199-4.jpg A. Lunacharsky

Lenin was building up the Bolshevik Party with the insight of the organising genius, and he saw in Lunacharsky a confirmed revolutionary and an outstanding orator.

Lunacharsky took part in the work of the Bolshevik newspapers Vperyod and Proletary under the pen name of Voinov; he toured Switzerland, France, Belgium and Germany on Party assignments, and spoke at meetings and rallies against the Mensheviks.

Lenin greatly valued Lunacharsky's lively and responsive mind, his extraordinary polemic enthusiasm and skill in attacking the enemy.

Nadezhda Krupskaya recalled Lunacharsky's work in Vperyod: "Lenin put a special value on those editors and correspondents who had a sense of form. This was not only a question of language and style, but of the whole manner of presenting and elaborating a point. Lenin valued Lunacharsky in this respect especially, and said so on more than one occasion. When someone mentioned a bright idea, Lunacharsky would pick it up and put it into brilliant form with such skill and grace that even 127 its author marvelled at the result. I have been present during some of Lenin's talks with Lunacharsky and saw for myself how the two men seemed to 'charge' one another.''

Lunacharsky's path to the October Revolution was not a straight or simple one. On more than one occasion Lenin resolutely criticised his keenness on the idealistic philosophy of Mach and Avenarius, whose lectures Lunacharsky had attended at Zurich University. While still under the influence of his friend, A. Bogdanov, Lunacharsky was a member of the Vperyod group, which had broken away from Lenin. But Lenin, despite some sharp criticisms of Lunacharsky in his writings, was confident that he would return to the right path. This is borne out by Gorky, who quotes Lenin as saying: "Lunacharsky will return to the Party___ He is a remarkably gifted person. I have a soft spot for him.... You know, I like him very much, he's a fine comrade.''

Indeed, from 1912 on, Lunacharsky was back in the ranks with Lenin.

You will find Lunacharsky's name on the faded but memorable and moving pages of the early post-- revolutionary journals and papers, reporting on his diverse activities connected with the theatre, museums, exhibitions, lectures and schools. During the famine and widespread ruin caused by the Civil War and the intervention, an unparalleled cultural development was started in the country. Lunacharsky threw himself wholly into this effort; he later admitted he slept no more than three to five hours a day.

``The revolution brings with it ideas of great scope, it kindles in every heart an intense and fervent desire to create, to perform bold, heroic feats.'' These words of Lunacharsky's at the Party's Sixth Congress give an idea of the pitch of his life since the first days of the Revolution.

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Let us now return to the Petrograd scene at the end of 1917. In the cold huge hall of the former Ministry of Education a solitary lamp cast a dim light on a group of people in nondescript clothes. Some were enthusiasts eager to work in public education, others were sullen ministerial officials and bureaucrats who had finally decided to collaborate. Stability had not been quite established in the country---and the atmosphere in the hall was naturally one of enthusiasm interspersed with irony and skepticism. The reactionary press abroad was heralding an early demise for the Bolsheviks and an early return for the tsarist generals to put an end to the " anarchy''. Lunacharsky, the People's Commissar for Education, spoke to the men and women in that gloomy hall. His voice was firm and vibrant, and his pince-nez glimmered. What he said carried conviction and he soon had the attention of the audience. He was saying, "Thirty days have passed since the Soviet power was established. This is a minor but significant milestone.'' He recalled that, according to the Bible, it took seven days to create the world; the Deluge lasted for 40 days; Napoleon had his 100 days, and the Paris Commune its 72. Both the young enthusiasts and the old officials alike joined in the applause. He drove the point home, "Comrades, our enemies said we would not hold out for more than three days. Some gave us a fortnight. We have now held out for a whole month, and I assure you that in three years' time you will still find us holding our own!''

Again there was a burst of applause and animation.

This episode gives an idea of Lunacharsky's great responsibility in that period.

Later, he could afford to smile as he recalled his arrival at the former tsarist ministry with a handful of fellow workers from the People's Commissariat for Education. The officials had been furious and had announced their intention to walk out the moment Lunacharsky set foot __PRINTERS_P_129_COMMENT__ 9---2330 129 on the premises. And they had done so. Lunacharsky found the rooms and corridors empty, but that did not discourage him. He went straight to the office and summoned a meeting, the first general meeting of the staff. In came stokers, messenger boys, janitors and other employees. Speaking on their behalf, a man called Monakhov upbraided the deserters and expressed readiness to work.

``That's splendid,'' said Lunacharsky. "You may rest assured, comrades, that we will not be deterred by difficulties and are not afraid of any sabotage.''

A new bustling life began at the People's Commissariat for Education. The declaration addressed to all the citizens of Russia, written by Lunacharsky in November 1917 and approved by Lenin, was a manifesto on wholesale literacy and free education, and the establishment of the new school for the working people.

In his office of the Kremlin Lenin had many a talk with Lunacharsky about schools, libraries, museums, theatres, books, newspapers and journals. All this was within the ambit of Lunacharsky's Commissariat and he himself was its heart and soul. He would always leave Lenin inspired and marvelling at the inexhaustible wisdom of that great man.

``I think,'' he used to say, "that in all of history, no people has ever had a man born in its midst like Lenin---a man of exceptional revolutionary temperament and fighting spirit, a man not only with the mind of a genius but with the skill of decisive action.''

The Party attached particular importance to remoulding the mentality of the intelligentsia, especially those who worked in art, and who had been brought up to the bourgeois way of life. Lenin said that "in the hands and heads" of this intelligentsia lay the cultural heritage of the past, which was indispensable for building the new society. Some had responded instantly to the revolution 130 and joined the proletarian camp unhesitatingly; others were downright reactionaries who advocated boycott and sabotage; but the majority wavered between the two poles. Lunacharsky did much to help the Party win the intelligentsia for the revolution. He did this with his great tact, personal charm and the knack of overcoming hostility. Nemirovich-Danchenko, the actor, recalled: "We on the stage have not forgotten how in the first months of the revolution we would come to the meetings, teeth clenched and boiling over with 'protest' but after a fiery speech lasting an hour and punctuated with gentle but irresistible logic, all our doubts were dispelled and we were ready to follow the leader into the fray. And we were the most stubborn and irreconcilable people!''

Lenin showed a keen interest in Lunacharsky's daily work, and the latter later recalled with emotion how he always went to seek Lenin's advice at difficult moments. Here is one case: "I went to see Lenin during the 1918--19 season---I don't remember the exact date---and told him that I intended to exert all efforts to preserve the best theatres in the country. I added that their repertoire was naturally old, but we were going to clean it out. The public, especially the working people, were eager theatregoers. They, and the spirit of the times, would compel even the most conservative stage management to change gradually, and I thought the change would come about relatively soon. I thought it inadvisable and dangerous to break things up because we had no ready substitute of our own. What is more, if we did so, the many valuable cultural threads could be cut off from the new outgrowths. For it stands to reason that, although the music of the non-too-distant future, after the victory of the Revolution, would indeed become truly proletarian and socialist, it did not at all follow that we had to close down the conservatories and music-schools and burn __PRINTERS_P_131_COMMENT__ 9* 131 the old `feudal and bourgeois' instruments and musical scores.

``Lenin heard me out and said that I should stick to that line, but should also remember to promote the new that was being born under the influence of the Revolution. The latter may at first be weak, he said, but aesthetic judgement alone would not do, as otherwise the old and more mature art would tend to stifle the growth of the new---and though the old art itself would continue to change, would do so less rapidly than if it were spurred by competitive new trends.''

A decree signed by Lenin and Lunacharsky, on the unification of all stage activities, was published on August 26, 1919. It set up a Central Stage Committee, headed by Lunacharsky, to deal with various questions related to creative work and the everyday needs of the theatres and their staffs, and to handle the distribution of rations, living quarters and theatre tickets.

It was the policy of the Party and the Soviet Government, implemented by Lunacharsky, to preserve everything that was valuable in the old theatre, and to promote the development of new trends on the stage engendered under the impact of the Revolution.

I remember the Moscow of those days, blanketed in snow, cold and hungry. The fighting was going on at the Civil War fronts. The Red Army had to be armed, clothed and fed. Except for an occasional tram that clanged past with a terrible screech, the city transport was almost at a standstill. People, in shawls, sheepskin coats and feltboots, trudged the streets pulling heavily-laden sledges. There were frequent power cuts and at night the streets were pitch-dark. But every day, on time, dozens of theatres lifted their curtains to packed houses of new audiences consisting chiefly of workers and Red Army men.

The reconstruction of the old theatre made slow and 132 difficult headway during the years of the Civil War and ruin. People's Commissar Lunacharsky had to cope not only with material difficulties but chiefly with the numerous opponents to his ``humanism'', who categorically demanded "the proletarisation" of all theatrical art, the liquidation of the ``bourgeois'' academic theatres and the establishment of entirely new theatres for revolutionary agitation.

The idea that it was "easy to destroy but impossible to restore'', was the leading one in most of Lunacharsky's addresses and articles of those years, when he struggled against the ``Leftists'' who had gone so far as to assert that the classical heritage was ``useless'', say, harmful to the proletariat.

He was a confirmed supporter of realistic art and strove to implement this line.

His subtle understanding of the secrets of the creative art of actors, writers, painters and musicians brought him close to them. Somehow he always seemed to know what was on the mind of this or that scholar; he knew first what some young playwright was writing, what new role the actor Yuzhin was studying, what was worrying the poet Mayakovsky, what productions Stanislavsky and Vakhtangov were working on, and what the young theatrical studio was preparing.

Lunacharsky himself was widely read but highly modest and he never foisted on others his own views or preferences but very tactfully gave them guidance.

In the early years of the Revolution, there were lively debates everywhere and polemics in the press on the future of proletarian culture. Proletcult, a special organisation within the Commissariat for Education, held the deeply erroneous view that all the cultural achievements of the past must be discarded. Lenin opposed these assertions on many occasions, and at the Third Congress of the Young Communist League, held on October 2, 1920, said, 133 ``We shall be unable to solve this problem unless we clearly realise that only a precise knowledge and transformation of the culture created by the entire development of mankind will enable us to create a proletarian culture. The latter is not clutched out of thin air; it is not an invention of those who call themselves experts in proletarian culture. That is all nonsense. Proletarian culture must be the logical development of the store of knowledge mankind has accumulated under the yoke of capitalism.''

Lunacharsky practised this, elaborating the idea that the culture of the past must be thoroughly assimilated. He held this stand in the midst of fierce controversial disputes and sharply rebuffed nihilists of every stripe who suggested that even Pushkin should be jettisoned from their so-called "modern ship".

But in his address to the Proletcult Congress, in October 1920, Lunacharsky supported its demand for autonomy within the system of the Commissariat for Education. When Lenin learned of this, he wrote: "We see from Izvestia of October 8 that, in his address to the Proletcult Congress, Comrade Lunacharsky said things that were diametrically opposite to what he and I had agreed upon yesterday.

``It is necessary that a draft resolution (of the Proletcult Congress) should be drawn up with the utmost urgency, and that it should be endorsed by the Central Committee, in time to have it put to the vote at this very session of the Proletcult.''

Lunacharsky later wrote in his reminiscences: "During the Congress of the Proletcult, in 1920 I think it was, Lenin instructed me to attend and state categorically that Proletcult and its activities should be guided by the Commissariat for Education, and that it should regard itself as a subordinate institution, etc. In other words, Lenin wanted us to pull up the Proletcult closer to the state, while he himself took measures also to draw it 134 closer to the Party. My speech at the Congress was couched in rather evasive and conciliatory terms.... Lenin was given the gist of it in still milder form. He summoned me and reprimanded me severely.''

The point was that this involved not only organisational questions, for behind its slogans of ``autonomy'' and ``freedom'' Proletcult pursued the aim of substituting for the Party in cultural construction.

Life itself confirmed that Lenin and the Party had taken the right stand.

On September 19, 1925, the State Academic Theatre of Dramatic Art (the former Alexandrinsky Theatre) in Leningrad was packed. The cream of the city's art workers were gathered to hear Lunacharsky speak of the Soviet Government's basic principles in regard to the theatre. The hush in the hall was such as always greets a popular speaker. His words are full of calm and confidence: "Never before at any period or year have I felt the full justification of the Soviet Government's policy in this sphere, whose vehicle I have the honour to be entrusted with. Those who give me credit for implementing a personal policy, simply do not know how our state system works. I have only been implementing the policy of the Soviet Government, a policy that has been examined and approved by our central state and Party institutions ... and never before have I had greater confidence in its correctness. Of course, we still have many drawbacks and needs in various spheres, but I believe that the theatre is better provided for in this respect than other branches of art, all of which, in general, have undoubtedly attained great heights in the Soviet Union.''

2

Many writers, artists, musicians and painters of the 1920s and 1930s were regular visitors at Lunacharsky's flat on the fifth floor of the tall building at the corner 135 of Glazovsky Lane (now Lunacharsky Street). It was something of an occasion to call on him to seek his advice and encouragement. In his spacious rooms they staged concerts or discussed new books, plays and exhibitions. The atmosphere was one of profound understanding of creative art and deep appreciation of its contemporary forms. All this was natural, unaffected and vital, like the life that was born of the October Revolution.

Lunacharsky's range of interests as a reader was very wide. Most -people who study the humanities tend to be indifferent to the natural sciences, mathematics, physics, medicine and astronomy. But Lunacharsky had taken a natural science course at the university and kept abreast of the latest achievements in this field by reading Russian and foreign journals. To each specialist he spoke his own idiom and they all marvelled at his knowledge. Take his speech at the celebrations to mark the bicentenary of the Academy of Science. In the audience were prominent scientists from many countries. He spoke to them on the meaning of science first in Russian, and then in German, French, English and Italian, and ended in Latin.

Among those who regularly went to see Lunacharsky at home were the writers Alexei Tolstoi, Alexander Fadeyev, Vladimir Mayakovsky, Mikhail Koltsov, Vera Inber, losif Utkin, Ilya Selvinsky and Boris Pasternak; playwrights Anatoly Glebov, Natan Erdman, Sergei Tretyakov; artistes Alexander Yuzhin, Yuri Yuriev, Ivan Kozlovsky, Alexander Baturin, Vera Dulova, Varvara Massalitinova, Yevdokiya Turchaninova and Yelena Gogoleva. There were also his old friends and comrades-- inexile I. Grossman-Roshchin and P. Lebedev-Polyansky, and political figures like F. Raskolnikov, Vladimir Antonov-Ovseyenko, A. Yegorov and M. Litvinov.

This list could be extended but that would hardly help to give a fuller idea of the steady tide of men and women of diverse professions, talent and frame of mind, who 136 came to see Lunacharsky day in day out. He had the remarkable talent of bringing people together, even when their interests were poles apart.

From the start of his literary career, Lunacharsky sought fresh forms of expression in his critical essays. He often turned to dialogue, and one of his early theoretical works entitled A Dialogue on Art (1905) was written in a dramatic conversational form. Young Lunacharsky called his collection of one-act plays and short stories Ideas in Masks (1912). He sought to present his ideas in images and to show their action and interplay.

His last work Gogoliana (1933) is also in the form of a dialogue, which enabled him to show the clash of ideas. Thus, he has two persons arguing about the staging of Byron's mystery Cain, one presenting the bourgeoisliberal view, the other, the revolutionary.

Lunacharsky was always wanted by a host of people. There were constant phone calls from the editorial offices of newspapers and journals, from scientific institutions, lecturing organisations and workers' clubs. He was sought for everywhere and even stopped in the street. He simply could not put anyone off and the pushier types simply whisked him off to whatever meeting they had going. This must have greatly taxed his physical and mental powers, but his vitality sprang from this incessant exchange of impressions and knowledge. His idea of rest was a change. Once, while down with the flu he translated some poems by Sandor Petofi, the Hungarian classic.

Lunacharsky's love for the stage was pre-eminent among his many loves. In 1924, he wrote: "I have loved the theatre since childhood and naturally gave it much attention. I made a special study of the stage, stage criticism, the history of playwriting.

``During the first years as Commissar for Education, I was even reproached for allegedly devoting too much attention to the theatre.''

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In fact, Lunacharsky responded---and instantly---to every new development in the theatre: a new production, the anniversary of some noted artist, a new Soviet play, an interesting production experiment or an excellent performance by some actor. On every such occasion he came up with a short theatrical review, theoretical article, public address, discussion on creative art, report or lecture.

Lunacharsky could put off a book half-read, but he always sat through a play, however poorly staged, in the hope of finding some little bright spot.

This was in fact due to his well-known kindness, which, a larger look reveals, was misconstrued; he readily conceded secondary issues, but remained indomitable on questions of principle: he never gave in on what he believed to be wrong. Thus, although he valued Meyerhold's considerable achievements in the creation of the new theatre, and supported his quest in that direction, hailing his productions of Gogol's The Inspector-General and Erdman's Mandate Lunacharsky never spared Meyerhold when the latter made mistakes. Lunacharsky was fond of saying that a critic was an assistant in the work of a theatre and not a buzzing mosquito evoking for a spot to bite into. That was his stand as an art critic.

Lunacharsky was highly intolerant of the attitude shown by some critics who wrote a review to gloat over a poor performance. He said, "To my deep regret, I often see much obvious rejoicing in articles and reviews when a production is a flop and fails to attain the aims set before the artist.''

A man of wit and perspicacity, Lunacharsky never ridiculed any poor performance without good reason.

Almost from the very first days of the Revolution, he devoted much attention to the repertory of the Soviet theatre. He was wary of hasty experiments in drama. Once he told a group of young playwrights a Chinese parable: of a mandarin who, in his efforts to please his 138 master, decked the leafless branches of trees with paper flowers and assured him that spring had come. This image of "the paper spring" is often used in his critical articles. "This official paper spring is what we should shun most in our theatre. I urge you to produce true revolutionary plays and not topical bits of propaganda,'' he concluded.

Lunacharsky's own plays were prominent in the varied and motley repertoire of the 1920s. They ran in many Moscow and provincial theatres and in progressive WestEuropean theatres, and were highly controversial. Compared with the general level of playwriting in that early revolutionary period, his plays were most unusual and highly intricate; they dealt with major social and philosophical ideas but sometimes were too involved.

Lenin liked Lunacharsky's play The King's Barber. And the latter wrote to the producer: "I am proud to say that I have heard a sufficiently favourable comment, even if a verbal one, from our great leader Lenin, who is not easily given to praise. Lenin, of course, pointed out what is most important, namely, the effort, on the one hand, to analyse what is royal power, the social contradictions it thrives on, and on the other hand, to show the natural transformation of its monstrous craving for power into a kind of madness.''

Despite his tireless everyday official activity, Lunacharsky found time to write, something he always enjoyed doing.

Lunacharsky had many friends abroad, among them Remain Rolland, Henri Barbusse and Bernard Shaw. I recall one summer night in Moscow in 1931. Two outstanding men were sitting in a small living room whose open windows admitted the sound of the bustling city. One of the men, tall and straight-backed, and known the world over from his portraits in the press, had an unusually vigorous and expressive face adorned with a grey 139 beard. He was Bernard Shaw, our guest from Britain. Despite his ripe age his lively eyes shone with almost youthful enthusiasm. Lunacharsky sat in an armchair opposite.

I listened attentively to their conversation. In Moscow, Bernard Shaw was about to mark his 75th birthday anniversary.

``I am well known for my paradoxes,'' he said, "and so as the oldest writer, I want to celebrate my birthday in the youngest country of the world.''

Lunacharsky followed Shaw's writings with interest and always wrote, sometimes quite sharply---with good will, but without surrendering principles, of Shaw's errors and reformist delusions. And in this talk, too, Lunacharsky told his guest straightforwardly that he considered his last plays, including Saint Joan, to be unsuccessful and rather at variance with the times. Shaw asked for details.

``I don't think you intended to write a strictly historical play,'' said Lunacharsky. "It appears to me that you. have sacrificed authenticity for the sake of an idea, and what is the result? You have whitewashed the Middle Ages and the Inquisition in order to extol Joan of Arc. You have virtually turned her into a provincial maiden and a nationalist.''

Shaw objected weakly and his smile was somewhat confused.

``I wanted to ridicule the invaders, and I think I have succeeded. But I agree that in that form my play is unsuitable for you. You should stage my play The Devil's Disciple, which I wrote in my younger days. It is sharplyworded, with much resolve, and what is most important, all its planes are displaced, good and evil are mixed, in short, it is the unadulterated Shaw.''

Another topic came up. Lunacharsky told Shaw that he regarded him as a true friend of the Soviet Union and recalled his 1921 article in defence of Soviet Russia.

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``At that time I did not as yet have a sufficiently clear understanding of Lenin's role,'' Shaw said, "although I did understand it better than my fellow writer, H. G. Wells.''

``Possibly,'' said Lunacharsky, "still you said Lenin was the most interesting statesman of modern Europe.''

``I don't deny that,'' said Shaw, "but I now see Lenin's greatness with greater clarity. You are working on Lenin's behests, while the Western socialists are trying to push the stone up to the summit, but it rolls down each time.''

A few days later, addressing a Moscow audience in the TUC House of Columns, Shaw made a point of saying a few words about Lunacharsky: "It has been a great pleasure for me to meet some people in person whom I had hitherto known only by name. Only a week ago Lunacharsky was but an eminent name; today I know him as a living personality. I have found him to be far more than just a Communist Party member. I found in him what only the Russians could give me: I mean the knack of understanding and assessing my own plays with such profundity and finesse as, I must admit, I had never encountered anywhere in Western Europe.''

Lunacharsky met Remain Rolland when he was an emigre in Paris. In his book Fifteen Years of Struggle (1935), Remain Rolland wrote: "The future Soviet Commissar for Education, Anatoly Lunacharsky, called on me at the end of January 1915. For me he was, so to say, an ambassador of the future, a herald of the approaching Russian revolution, of which he spoke calmly and confidently as of a foregone conclusion, and which would inevitably occur towards the end of the war.'' Rolland wrote, that listening to Lunacharsky's words he sensed the "birth of a new Europe and a new humanity".

Lunacharsky's meetings and discussions with Rolland must have undoubtedly influenced the famous French writer and imbued him more and more with Lenin's ideas that had the "purity and edge of a sword''. This is clearly 141 seen in Holland's article entitled "Lenin. Art and Action" written shortly after Lunacharsky's death. A comparison with Lunacharsky's last work, "Lenin and Literary Criticism" shows many common points.

Thus, Lunacharsky helped his foreign friends to understand the great truth propounded by Lenin of militant art being closely bound up with revolutionary action.

Alexander Deich

[142] ~ [143]

THE RIGHT STAND

[144] 199-5.jpg [145]

Lenin at a sitting of the June-July 1921
3rd Congress of the Comintern,

[146] __ALPHA_LVL1__ THE RIGHT STAND ~

LETTER FROM AFAR

Academician Axel Berg turned seventy in 1963. Gifts and felicitations began to arrive early in October, each sender playing up the figure ``seventy'' to the best of his ability. Then came the announcement that he had been awarded the title Hero of Socialist Labour, and there was another round of phone-calls and congratulations.

It was a few days after his birthday that he received a letter from a distant southern country. He had been wondering where to put the hundreds of messages of congratulations and the numerous gifts: electronic gadgets, transistor radios, models and all kinds of comic contraptions when he found it at the bottom of the day's mail. He sat down in the armchair to read it. He had intended to take only a minute, but was still thinking over it at midnight. He paced the floor in meditation, sat down to his typewriter, and thought again.

The letter was from an old friend, a fellow student at the naval school, whom he had last seen in 1918, exactly 45 years ago. In manner and tone the letter was strongly reminiscent of Ivan Bunin's prose of the later period: it conveyed the same spiritual loneliness and utter despondency.

__PRINTERS_P_147_COMMENT__ 10* 147

The author wrote that he was sitting in his rose garden, in the midst of luxuriant southern vegetation, with a fresh copy of Izvestia in his lap. There on the front page he had found a familiar face; the high forehead and straight look, and the caption: Axel Berg. He had begun to reminisce about Russia, and this had so stirred and jolted him that for the first time, in almost fifty years, he had written home to his native land. He was happy to know that at least one of their graduation class had proved useful to Russia, and, judging from the article, had done so much for her. He deplored his own past, which he said was petty and pointless. For a number of years now he had been simply awaiting his end, without fear or regret.

This letter, which for some reason reached Moscow in a roundabout way---via France and West Germany---was probably the most valuable one of all the messages of congratulation. It touched on the be all and end all of things. It was a fuller and truer summing up of what is commonly called a man's road in life than all the other long and warm messages taken together, with their detailed listing of his scientific discoveries and other merits.

THE ROOTS

In October 1917 they were all about 24. The First World War was in its third year and the young naval officers, recently graduated from Naval Corps, had all had a smell of powder. The war had scattered them. Some had become enemies: they joined Kolchak and Denikin and left Odessa on the last ships out; others stayed to work in the new Soviet Republic. It would seem that there was so much to hold them together: common origin---most came from well-to-do landowning families---childhood bonds and memories, the school years and the romanticism of the first training voyages.

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The entire system of the gentry's upbringing, developed over the centuries, made no allowances for independent action, the ability to reason and decide on a control of action. In the event of an emergency it was expected to trigger off without fail at the appointed hour. But the system collapsed. The world was split, and each had to think for himself.

199-6.jpg

A. Berg

Who knows why Berg refused to join Kolchak when his fellow mates in Petrograd summoned him from Helsingfors to discuss and decide what they, commissioned naval officers, were to do? What were the roots of his refusal, which shaped his whole life and subsequently enabled him to play such a notable role in Soviet science?

Berg himself rarely speaks of this.

__b_b_b__

Today, after almost half a century, many seem to think that everything in the world is easily explained. Did I understand anything in October 1917? Did I really see the difference between the various parties and their programmes, and the real meaning of the political struggle? Of course not. I was quite indifferent to politics. I loved the sea; I wrote my first scientific papers, gave much time to the study of mathematics and physics, and had a secret hope of becoming an astronomer.

I first heard of Lenin after his return from abroad. I had not the slightest notion that this man would explode my life. The nation was moving towards revolution. The Baltic Fleet was still fighting. We would call at the 149 naval base for repairs, learn the news, and go out to sea again; and every call at the base even for minor repairs blotted out the stunning news that came from the perturbed capital: we had to fight on, we had to survive.

I declined the offer to run away and join the Whites. 1 simply could not think of deserting my submarine and its crew (the submarine crew is always an extraordinary fraternity where the lives of all depend on each). For me the word ``country'' meant something very concrete, the sailors with whom I had fought side by side. That was my home, and I had no intention to leave it.

I remember that our crew was ordered to stand guard by Lenin when he spoke in the Great Hall of the Naval Corps. Hung with machine-gun cartridge belts and hand grenades, we stood there peering into the overflow audience. I looked around and studied the faces. This Great Hall was the home of my youth. There in that corner I had danced my first waltz. I wondered how many times I had stood there on the stage, the first violin of our amateur orchestra---on the very spot where Lenin now stood speaking? He spoke in a literary idiom, with a slight burr, and made no attempt to humour the audience. My sailors were drinking in every word! I wondered why.

__*_*_*__

A nobleman by birth and son of a tsarist general, Axel Berg accepted the Revolution without hesitation. In 1918, he was chief officer of the destroyer Kapitan Belli. In

1919, he was navigator of the Red Baltic Fleet's submarine Pantera and later commander of the submarine Ryss. In

1920, he became commander of the Volk, and with its crew in 1921 repaired and returned to active service the submarine Zmeya. For this he was awarded his first Soviet military decoration, Hero of Labour of the Separate Division of Baltic Fleet Submarines.

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At the end of 1922, Berg was involved in a shipwreck; he was injured, and was retired. His entry into science looked quite accidental: he had lost a finger. He at once took and passed a university examination and within three years was graduated from the Naval Academy. But there is an iron necessity behind everything that looks like pure chance. In fact, even in the hardest year of 1918, on the rare days when his submarine was laid up for repairs, Berg made a point of attending lectures at the university.

He recalls these occasions. "Not more than a dozen students would gather in auditoriums meant for 300. I shall never forget one lecture in particular, at the Polytechnical Institute. In the huge cold auditorium, a famous but very old and completely blind professor reading a lecture. Before him, I, the only student, taking down the formulas of mathematical statistics.''

__b_b_b__

Berg did not become an astronomer as he had wanted to as a youth. "Did he stifle his own song?" as the Russian poet put it. To some extent, perhaps, for he clearly realised what the Soviet Republic needed most at the time. He knew that there were fresh trials ahead for its fledgling fleet, and suspected that the answers to many riddles baffling navy men lay in the as yet embryonic science of radio engineering.

There was a shortage of scientific literature and materials for experiments. It was not yet clear what the wireless transmitter would be: an arc, a spark, a machine or a valve. Berg opted for the latter, and proved to be right.

He came into the world of science a full-fledged personality. He was not going to be a scientific hermit. With him came the wind of revolution, its fighting traditions and its approach to men. He was an entirely new type of research worker, born of the Soviet power, and one who felt involved in everything. It was the Revolution that 151 produced this remarkable alloy: obsession with science and a capacity for self-restraint in tackling the important state tasks of scientific organisation.

Berg became a scientist, an organiser of science, who regarded research as a continuation of the struggle for the new world started in October 1917. He never---not even in the most trying circumstances---retreated in his scientific battles, for that would have been tantamount to betrayal---a betrayal of Lenin, of his country, and of his own ideals.

His life was one long battle, against indifference and inertness in science and against smug complacency.

One day, someone asked him, "What is your definition of human happiness in general?''

``There is no such thing as happiness 'in general'. I have experienced the happiness of the scientist. For me happiness is my ideas embodied in tubes and generators, and the plants and institutes in which I had a hand. A source of personal happiness for me is also our combat-ready fleet and the government's decisions in support of our scientific work.''

Indeed, Berg's life, the life of a seaman, engineer and scientist, is very eventful. For all Soviet navy men Berg's name spells out as the first armament of the Soviet surface and submarine fleets, and of their subsequent rearmament and equipment with the latest Soviet-made radio devices.

Leningrad's wireless operators object, claiming Berg for their own. "He is a radio engineer,'' they insist.

Indeed the first generation of Soviet radio engineers--- and many after them---was trained on his works, a whole bookshelf of them printed on rough yellowish paper in the 1920s.

During the Second World War, Berg worked on radar. The difficulties were enormous: where to find the necessary funds to build and site dozens of new plants; where to find the specialists for them, those whom the war had 152 scattered far and wide, and how to provide for their various needs and housing? Step by step, remembering the small things as well as the important ones, he surmounted the obstacles. There was no time to spare: the war would not wait. Relaxation came only when he flew to attend some tests, to inspect and approve. Then he returned happy and content.

After the war, he was Deputy Minister of Defence, not what you might call a sinecure. Especially in those years of drastic change in the concept of modern warfare, with the accent on rocket weapons, and with the country's welfare and security literally hinging on day-to-day decisions.

In the sphere of radio electronics, Berg was one of the first to advocate the wider use of semi-conductors. He predicted that these miniature crystals would change the face of the radio electronics industry and would soon make their way into every home. He clearly visualised the compact devices of the future, and projected the picture of hundreds of computers taking over from man some of his most intricate, laborious and boring operations.

Berg even found the courage---rare among scientists and inventors---to abandon his own schemes and radio valves, which represented a whole epoch in radio technology, to make way for radio electronics.

__b_b_b__

Cybernetics is Berg's latest and possibly strongest obsession. Why? It may be because the scope and universality of cybernetics and its indisputable influence in the most unexpected spheres of life are very finely in tune with Berg's own restless character, his love of proportion and order in the vast realm of modern knowledge.

Or the answer may be that cybernetics is the future of science and of all of us, and tantalises him by its potential possibilities. A man with the mind of a statesman, a soldier and a scientist, Berg looks more and more to the future as the years go by. He seeks for new paths 153 of more rapid progress and wants to be sure that Soviet science does not lag even in the minor fields.

As the years went by, he realised ever more clearly, and felt physically almost, the truth of what Lenin said back in 1917, ''. . .either perish or overtake and outstrip the advanced countries economically as well. . . . Perish or forge full steam ahead. That is the alternative put by history.''

__*_*_*__

Berg drives home this point in all his lectures and speeches, his scientific papers and popular books.

He also thinks again and again of something else Lenin said, "In the last analysis, productivity of labour is the most important, the principal thing for the victory of the new social system.''

This probably explains why he is so attracted to cybernetics. For Berg the theory of automatic control, the development of self-adjusting automatic systems and the programming of education are primarily of tremendous economic importance. This is why his sharp and direct statements in discussions of the prospects of cybernetics, frequently irritate other scientists. "Whether a machine can think or not---what difference of principle does it make today?" he says. "The important thing is that electronic computers should work, that the plants making them should turn them out without defects, so that cybernetics could yield practical results right now.''

Berg is chairman of the council dealing with the complex problem of cybernetics under the Presidium of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Science. The council has 17 sections, ranging from technical cybernetics to structural linguistics. It is the chairman's duty to plot the basic directions in the work of each section, and to make the most rational distribution of the scientific personnel.

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Many specialists---chemists, physicists, cyberneticists, linguists and medical men---seek Berg's advice, ask for scientific information, and invite him to lecture and edit articles.

Berg once said, "Some of my old friends say I am wrong in so spreading myself. But that's cybernetics for you: it is the science of control, whether of the economy, or of psychological or physiological processes. It reaches out to everything. Take geology. We see geologists collecting rock samples all over the country, and admire them: there's romanticism and heroism for you, people lugging about weights in their rucksacks! But today heroism is a different thing: it is the knowledge of how to extract the maximum of useful information from these rock samples. To this very day geologists grope with their hands and barely have time to sort out a thousandth part of their finds. The rocks are piled up as dead stock. I am sure that if computers took a look at the old collections dozens of new mineral deposits would be discovered.''

To enhance reliability and improve planning and the organisation of labour, Berg travels all over the country, inspecting plants and giving advice.

However, programmed learning is one branch of cybernetics which he favours. I remember his lecture on the subject to the faculty of the Moscow Institute of Steel and Alloys, where he said:

``Very often we teach the wrong things and the wrong way. Meanwhile, school children and college students are terribly overtaxed. We have got into the habit of addressing ourselves to the average student, who is neither too bright nor too stupid. Nature knows no averages; averaging is the teachers' worst enemy.

``What is teaching from the standpoint of cybernetics? It is but one type of control. With the aid of machines we shall switch to individual methods of teaching. A modern machine, while teaching a person, can record the speed of his answers in electronic memory drums. It can, 155 moreover, either increase or slow down the pace of teaching depending on the student's capacities.''

There was animation and whispering in the hall.

``You should not think that cybernetics denies the role of the teacher,'' Berg went on. "On the contrary, it makes his work truly creative. But remember that only the most talented and industrious will be able to stay in teaching. Experience has shown that it is much more difficult to draw up a programme for the machine than just to read a lecture.''

``Which way cybernetics?" is naturally a subject of much discussion among scientists. But there are purely psychological complications as well, and this too is understandable: some want to take unwarranted shortcuts, others wish to take a roundabout way, or need to be helped with some suggestion.

It cannot be said that Berg is taking this psychological problem in his stride. Nor can it be said that it is always a pleasure to work with him. He is straightforward and not much of a diplomat; he may offend a person in the heat of argument, for the importance of the matter in hand makes him oblivious of all else. You take him as he is, and become friends. Or you don't.

But few people realise that beneath this peppery exterior the man inside is shy and very kind.

Few people are able to discern right away the deep inner feeling which at a crucial historical moment had prompted him to become a Red Navy commander. It is the feeling which helps to explain the man and his stand in life. The important thing is that this stand is the correct one, for it was the stand taken by Lenin.

Galina Bashkirova

[156] ~ [157]

A LIFE STORY

[158] 199-7.jpg [159]

Lenin and his wife Nadezhda Krupskaya among peasants of the village Kashino, November 1920

[160] __ALPHA_LVL1__ A LIFE STORY

Yelizaveta Gavrilova^---Liza---was raised among village folk driven by need into the workshops of the Russian Diesel Works and the Sampsonievsky Textile Mills in Petersburg.

She was brought up by Vasya, a fitter at the diesel works. They led an abject life, in damp, dark and congested quarters. But although Vasya rarely showed signs of tenderness he was kind.

Like all boys and girls who lived in such holes, she wore a long shirt---her only garment. She did her bit by washing floors, running errands to shops, and from the age of eight became a nanny to Vasya's child. His wife, Anna, worked at the mills, where Liza, who did not go to school, brought the infant in arms three times a day for its feeding.

The years 1895 and 1896, marked by recurrent strikes, were particularly memorable for the proletariat of St. Petersburg. The most impressive one was staged by the textile workers, including those of the Sampsonievsky Mill. As their looms came to a stand-still, there was an unusual silence rent by the clatter of galloping Cossacks along the Sampsonievsky Prospekt.

The strike lasted a long time and though Liza no longer had to take the infant to its mother, this did not make her any happier, for life had become much harder and there was less to eat, even of the coarse black bread, which was their staple. Those were hard times, indeed.

__PRINTERS_P_161_COMMENT__ 11---2330 161

A man who lived at the time defined it as a period of preparation for a popular revolution. He said the textile workers' strike was a famous industrial war. The imminent revolution was pregnant with new seed.

That man was Vladimir Lenin. He had begun to sow this seed two years earlier, when in the autumn of 1893 he first appeared in the Vyborg side workers' circles. Those he then met, never forgot him.

He was to be seen in various places: at the public library, in the lanes outside factories, among students and in the barracks of the Laferm factory workers.

He went to the lowly quarters of the workers who lay side by side on roughly hewn cots running along the walls. You got a physical shock as the damp stuffy air hit you in the face; through the dim haze you saw the pale, emaciated men dulled into a stupor by backbreaking toil, men who had nothing they could call their own--- shelter, clothing, food and even life itself.

Lenin knew that these men had a task in the present--- to fight for their freedom, and a promise in the future--- the revolution.

It was for the sake of that future that he was holding a meeting, there, on the Vyborg side, of the representatives of the city's Marxist circles, a meeting which led to the founding of the League of Struggle for the Emancipation of the Working Class.

Liza, a daughter of this class, naturally had no inkling at the time that some 20 years later her own life would be linked with that of this remarkable man, Vladimir Ulyanov, and his cause.

Her cheerless childhood ended at the age of 12, when she got a job at the mill where Uncle Vasya's wife, Anna, worked. Short and lean, she was not taken on right away. Later, on her first pay-day, there was some slight confusion when it turned out that she was short to reach up and collect her pay from the cashier who called out her name repeatedly.

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She worked with eight other girls of her own age who cleaned up the dirt, removed the dust and carried about the heavy cotton spools. They were still small enough to like to somersault in the piles of cotton, make dolls and play with them, and for this they were sometimes punished.

199-8.jpg Y. Vassilyeva

Liza grew up and became a spinner. Week after week, she toiled at her monotonous and joyless occupation in a hot, damp and stuffy atmosphere: ventilation was out to prevent damage of the yarn by cooling. She later wondered how she was able to stand all that: the fines, the insults and the abuse of the foremen. Then came the fighting year of 1905 and Liza---now called by her full name Yelizaveta---rebelled against the tsar and joined the others in marching under the red banner. Her youth had ended, she was grown up.

She quit her detestable job as a spinner and together with several of her friends got a job at the Erikson Telephone Works in St. Petersburg.

It was 1913. She had already married and borne a son.

The Erikson works was owned by a Swedish company. Its five- and six-storyed buildings of red brick towered in the very centre of the Vyborg side district. Yelizaveta began to work in the assembly shops on the top floor. Telephones and the equipment for telephone exchanges were assembled on long narrow tables. A strict-looking matron took her to her seat, to learn to handle all the tiny screws, coils and clamps.

But though she had changed her occupation, her life did not change, for the stolid foreign foremen were 163 indifferent to everything except their own interests and those of their masters and treated the workers in an off-hand manner.

The Vyborg side had always been a stronghold of the city's revolutionary-minded proletarians. An underground Bolshevik organisation was formed at the Erikson Works back in 1904. Yelizaveta---now called Vassilyeva (after her husband)---had started to work there the very winter the city's Bolsheviks decided to stage a general strike in commemoration of the Lena fusillade. Throughout the spring, leaflets and appeals were circulated from hand to hand in preparation of the May Day demonstration. All work was stopped on that day, as thousands of Erikson workers poured out into the street where they were joined by workers of the Tarshilov Yarn Mill, and those of the Novy Lessner Factory. They all carried red banners and sang:

Rise up, all ye working people!
Rise up to struggle, ye hungry masses!

When the marchers drew level with police headquarters, its heavy gates swung open, and out charged the mounted police: they whipped the unarmed workers and trampled them with their horses. The air was filled with cries and the obscene shouts of the police.

Yelizaveta Vassilyeva was in those ranks, and the police lash fell on her too.

There was no end to the political demonstrations, meetings and strikes. A new revolution was in the making. In 1914, on the eve of the First World Waj, the Erikson workers took part in a city-wide political strike, which developed into an open fight against the autocracy. Barricades were erected on the Vyborg side, and Yelizaveta was once again with the people. She no longer feared the arrogant foremen, nor could she conceal her anger at the lawlessness and arbitrary rule. And when she heard of Lenin's words that "slowly but surely the revolutionary strike is awakening, enlightening and 164 organising the popular masses for the revolution'', she felt that although he was abroad and far away, what he said coincided remarkably with what she herself felt.

Life demanded of her still greater strength and firmness. With the outbreak of the war, production at the factory was stepped up and expanded to meet the needs of war. The work itself became more arduous and exhausting. She had been married for just over three years, and her husband, Semyon, a foundry fitter, was sent to the front.

At first his letters were few, and then there were none at all. On hot summer Sundays, Yelizaveta and her son used to go out of town to Shuvalovo. There she would sit under the tall pines by the lake-side and curse the war in her loneliness. She lived in hope and waited. But soon, like many other young women who had not fully experienced the joys of family life, she learned that she was a widow. In that year, 1915, and the next, more strikes were staged by the city's proletarians, and she was always with them.

Food prices rose from day to day, eroding workers' wages. The bread-lines grew longer and longer.

The war was in its third year, and millions of people were asking themselves this question: "What are we fighting for?" Lenin wrote in this connection: "That the capitalists in their scramble for the division of the colonies and the enslavement of other nations, in their zeal to secure greater profits and advantages on the world market, were subjecting humanity to unheard of suffering and privations.''

Yelizaveta could not read or write, so her comrades advised her to go to a Sunday-school. "You will at least learn how to sign your own name,'' they said.

It was difficult, with a child on her hands, but she took the advice and persevered. She completed two classes, and could read books and newspapers: a new world of knowledge opened before her.

At the Erikson Works the Bolshevik paper Pravda was 165 circulated secretly, passing from one pair of loyal hands to another. To evade the tsarist censorship it was published under various names, such as Rabochaya Pravda, or Rabochy or Pravda Truda.

The authorities had destroyed the Bolshevik paper's printing offices shortly before the war, but the Vyborg side district, like the whole of the proletarian city---now called Petrograd---continued to learn the truth from leaflets, proclamations and revolutionary Party pamphlets.

Lenin's ideas, his fiery words and passionate appeals also reached Yelizaveta. She was enlightened by her new skills of reading and writing, and determined to resist violence.

To her also applied Lenin's prophetic words that "while the war brought endless horrors and privations to the working masses, it also tended to enlighten and mould their best representatives".

She listened to the opinions and explanations of the leading workers at the factory; she pondered their words and became more resolute and collected. Like the others she, too, looked forward to change.

She was no longer the confused and disheartened soldier's widow that she had been for a time when she first heard of her husband's death. All about her she saw the speedy preparations being made for the revolution in Petrograd---her own city.

The Erikson workers were always in the vanguard of the Vyborg side proletariat, and their works played a leading role in the revolutionary events in the district. It was from there, from the Vyborg side, that the workers and soldiers mobilised their forces against the autocracy in February 1917, and crossing Liteiny Bridge and the ice-bound Neva, struck their main blow against the massed tsarist forces in the heart of the city. Many of the Red Guard members who took part in this operation came from the Erikson Works.

Without fear or hesitation, Yelizaveta joined a 166 red-banner march across the ice-bound Neva to the city's aristocratic area. It was a windy day, and the footpath was blocked with snow which crunched underfoot. They had almost reached the left bank when the Cossacks attacked.

Her whip-lash wound healed, but the scar remained for life. An old press-operator who had then helped her to her feet said, "Buck up, Yelizaveta, there is no sea without water, or war without blood. They will pay dearly for this!''

The year of 1917 wore on, February and March passed. On April 3, Lenin returned to Russia. Thousands came to meet him on his arrival at the Finlyandsky Station on the Vyborg side. There was a band and red banners fluttered gaily in the floodlights.

A week later Yelizaveta read in Pravda Lenin's speech addressed to the soldiers. It said, in part: "It is not the police nor the officials who are not responsible to the people, nor the regular army which is detached from the people, but the armed people itself united by the Soviets who should govern the state.''

It was becoming increasingly clear to every worker and to her what had to be done in order to end the police whippings and starvation once and for all. A fortnight later, she at last saw the man who by then was known throughout Russia---Lenin.

The turbulent winter, full of alarm and unrest, was coming to an end. Spring was approaching, and never in all of Petrograd's history had there been a more exciting one, for it seemed to call forward to action. Never in Russia's history had the international workers' holiday, May Day, been so massively and solemnly celebrated, as in 1917. There was a steady hum of meetings in all the squares and marchers streamed towards Marsovo Polye, a great field, from all directions. Lenin marched with the Vyborg side column, in which further down to the rear ranks, Yelizaveta and her comrades also marched.

The mood was festive, and the people had a sense of their own strength.

167

On Marsovo Polye, Lenin spoke from an elevated wooden platform decorated with twigs and red bunting. He urged the working class of Russia to consolidate the international brotherhood of the workers of the world.

Standing near the platform, Yelizaveta clearly saw and heard him; she stared straight at him and nodded in response to his appeals.

Lenin delivered another speech at the Franco-Russian factory on May 12: "Comrades,'' he began, "we are having a revolution in Russia; there is a Provisional Government in power, but what has that given the workers?''

Young and old---listened with bated breath as he drove home his points: "The peasants must wrest the land from the landlords, and the workers the factories from the capitalists. All state power must belong to the Soviets of Workers', Soldiers' and Peasants' Deputies.''

Yelizaveta listened attentively. Lenin used simple, understandable words, as though he was addressing each one of them personally. When the meeting ended, the people crowded around him, ready and eager to follow him.

In June, the Erikson workers demanded that the Petrograd Soviet should consist mostly of workers. They expelled all Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries from their election meetings, adopted a Bolshevik mandate for their works committee, and issued a sharp protest against the continuation of the imperialist war.

On July 4, about half a million people filled the streets of Petrograd, carrying slogans "All power to the Soviets!" and "Down with the capitalist Ministers!''. This was immediately followed by mass arrests, searches, the disarming of revolutionary soldiers, and shootings.

Lenin had to go into hiding. On July 6, together with his wife Nadezhda Krupskaya, he went to the Vyborg side, a district of which she later wrote: "In those July days, there was a striking difference between the mood of the worker and that of the man in the street. The latter 168 would be complaining everywhere---in the tramcars or in the streets---but once you got over the wooden bridge leading to the Vyborg side, you found yourself in a totally different world.''

Lenin was safe on the Vyborg side, for there the Bolsheviks were in control. Kerensky's sleuths kept away, for they knew that the Bolsheviks dominated the district's Soviet, the Duma, the factories and regimental barracks. Lenin had said on more than one occasion that he felt exceptionally secure on the Vyborg side.

Only Lenin's closest comrades knew of his whereabouts in those days of reaction. Petrograd's revolutionary workers, although alarmed for his safety, were sure that he was well, and at his post.

In August 1917, the Erikson workers opposed the policy of the Provisional Government and the conciliatory parties which wanted to make up with the reactionaries in the Petrograd Soviet, and demanded the establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat. Yelizaveta helped the Bolsheviks. She supported them wherever she could, distributed their literature and argued with those who peddled the line of the Mensheviks and the SocialistRevolutionaries. A revolutionary crisis was maturing, preparations for the final attack were being made in the factories, barracks and aboard warships.

Again Lenin found protection in the Vyborg side where he met with the leading Party workers and discussed with them various aspects of the armed uprising.

On October 16, an enlarged session of the Bolshevik Party's Central Committee, with Lenin presiding, adopted the resolution on the armed uprising. It also selected the headquarters for the Revolutionary Military Committee.

On October 25, 1917, 20,000 armed Red Guard fighters, one-quarter of whom came from the Vyborg district, carried out Lenin's plan successfully. The revolution won.

In fulfilling the assignment given them by the 169 Revolutionary Military Committee, the Erikson workers occupied the Manege and the Military Technical School building, and together with the Izhorsky Factory workers and the Putilov Factory workers stormed the Winter Palace. They were sent to guard the Smolny and to take over the Finlyandsky Railway Station. Yelizaveta was among those who took over the station.

In 1918, the Erikson Works, already nationalised, was renamed Krasnaya Zarya (Red Dawn) and there was a great deal of meaning in those words.

The Vyborg side people met their first Soviet New Year with Lenin and Krupskaya, who came to attend the festivities in the hall of the former Mikhailovsky Military School.

``The future belongs to us!" Lenin said that night. "The Vyborg side workers have always been in the vanguard. You were in the front ranks when you fought for the victory of the October Revolution, and I hope you will similarly defend its gains.''

Yelizaveta was enthralled by the bustling activities and preparations at the factory, in the city and in the country as a whole. She felt like the old Putilov Factory worker, Ozerov, who, after meeting Lenin at the Finlyandsky Station, had said, "The old hey-there Ivan is dead---there is instead the proletarian, Ivan Ozerov, who has found his pivot and will live.''

And so Yelizaveta, too, would never again be the mill girl leading a wretched, hopeless existence; she, too, had found her ``pivot'' and had become a red proletarian for the rest of her life.

But times were still very hard and often quite discouraging. But all the workers knew that they were now working for themselves---not for Erikson---and that the fines, the scolding and the abuse were out.

On October 23, virtually on the very eve of the armed uprising, the Erikson Factory cashier had collected the workers' payroll, a sum of 450,000 rubles. En route to the 170 factory he was attacked by a band of anarchists and robbed of the money.

What was there to be done in the circumstances?

Alexei Semyonov, an Erikson worker and a member of the Petrograd Soviet, decided to go and see Lenin at the Smolny.

Lenin instantly issued instructions to help the workers. At the R.M.C. meeting then in session, he wrote: " Urgently Pa7 out to Comrade Semyonov the sum of 500,000 rubles for wages to the Erikson Factory workers. Lenin.''

When the money arrived and the workers got their pay, they felt for the first time that they were real masters of their own life and work.

They defended their cause selflessly in the days of the Yudenich offensive. Thousands of Petrograd workers left for the front to defend the young Republic in response to Lenin's appeal issued first in May, and then again in the autumn of 1919. Nearly all the able-bodied men from the Krasnaya Zarya Works went to the front.

It was during those grim days that Yelizaveta joined the Bolshevik Party.

She very quickly joined in the activities of the factory Party organisation. She enjoyed doing social work--- apart from her basic work at the factory. She took an interest in the lives of her comrades, spoke at meetings and took part in voluntary labour stints. A year later, in 1920, she was elected Secretary of the factory's Party organisation.

It was a time when one mobilisation effort followed another---against Kolchak, Denikin and Wrangel. Soviet Russia was battling against interventionists from 14 foreign states, and against "its own" white guards. Communists and non-party volunteers were leaving for near and distant fronts, and women took their places at the factories.

And so Yelizaveta, who had just joined the Party, had the task of teaching others rather than learning anything 171 herself from her seniors. She became a member of a threeman labour committee, which included the factory director and the chairman of the factory committee, and together they settled the numerous problems at the factory.

Very often she used to repeat the memorable words: he who slackens in order and discipline lets the enemy penetrate into our midst.

Whatever her assignment, she always threw herself wholeheartedly into its fulfilment, sparing neither time nor energy. When the task was to take care of waifs and strays she---a member of the Cheka, then working for child welfare on Lenin's instructions---searched for homeless children in underground hide-outs and dilapidated buildings throughout the city and took them to special children's homes.

She had a well of sympathy and responded to other people's sorrows as though they were her own.

She made skilful use of strictness, kindness and persuasion in teaching the strays how to work. She took them to the workshops and the club and brought them books from the library. She realised with ever greater clarity that she needed to exercise great patience---for it was sometimes easier to recapture a village from the enemy than to win back a soul from the old world, and she fought the more relentlessly to achieve that.

She returned to her old factory, and eagerly resumed her former work on the assembly of condensers and soon became one of the leading workers of her section. She did not go back to her old room, but took up a new place on the Petrograd side.

After the Civil War, many other former Erikson workers returned to their old factory. Production and the steady rhythm of life picked up in the country, which started to build socialism.

Lenin was gone, but workers and peasants joined the Party in great numbers. Their solemn faces showed that they realised that the burden of responsibility Lenin had 172 carried now fell on their shoulders. It was responsibility for the cause of the Revolution.

The reconstruction of the Krasnaya Zarya Works was started in 1925. It was subsequently enlarged and renewed, for the nation needed long telephone lines for its railways, factories, cities and towns. The first automatic telephone exchange began to operate in Rostov in 1927. A similar exchange was built in Moscow in 1930. The country was fulfilling its First Five-Year Plan.

In those days, "socialist emulation" and "shock work" became household words as did terms like "work teams'', "economic accounting'', and "freedom from foreign economic dependence".

The city, which now bore Lenin's name, was called upon to play the same role in industrialising the country as its proletariat had played at all the stages of the socialist revolution.

By the early 1920s, Yelizaveta had become at first team-leader and, later, foreman of the condenser shop. Most of the workers in her shop were women, and had come from the countryside. They had to be taught various skills fast---to assemble and adjust the automatic telephones---as the new lines of production demanded.

Yelizaveta, the Bolshevik expert, knew how to educate the new generation of the working class. Her team was the first to raise the planned targets, and the first also to start socialist emulation in the shop. She was its heart and soul, and inspired her workers to a fine effort. They enrolled at technical schools and institutes, and did social work.

As the chief organiser of her shop, she was a true friend of all her workers. She strove to improve their living conditions, urged the establishment of nurseries, and went to see Sergei Kirov at the Smolny about housing.

The housing situation was then most deplorable: old dwellings were falling into ruin, and few new ones were being built. The Krasnaya Zarya workers elected her as their deputy to the district Soviet and later also to the 173 Leningrad Soviet, and instructed her to do something about housing. As a result of her efforts, the 16 preconstructed houses that were subsequently allotted to the factory were occupied by its most needy worker families.

The years passed, bringing great change to these parts: new residential blocks sprang up around the spacious Karl Marx Park; new schools, a palace of culture, cinemas, hospitals, a kitchen-factory and a laundry embellished the old workers' quarter, and its old streets were converted into splendid avenues.

Lenin would have hardly recognised the Malaya Spasskaya---where he had addressed a meeting of SocialDemocrat students in 1895, Yazykova Lane, with its towering buildings of the scientific institute, or the Serdobolskaya, from which new streets radiate across onetime dumping grounds and vacant lots.

Time has, of course, also left its mark on Yelizaveta. It has added to her wrinkles; but despite the silver strands in her auburn hair, she is still indefatigable, be it in guiding the work at the factory or in replying to letters from Young Pioneers, airmen and young people, or in publishing articles like "There is no return to the past''. Neither the trials of life nor of war had broken her.

A radio broadcast told her of the outbreak of the Great Patriotic War in 1941. There followed a mass meeting at the factory gates, and the solemn pledge to halt the enemy and rout him. Barricades, trenches and anti-tank ditches were dug around the city.

Yelizaveta saw her son off to the front and was immersed in her work. Until the cold days of December, when a part of the factory was evacuated, it continued to produce its defence hardware. Only a few people remained behind to fight fires, and Yelizaveta, the teamleader, was one of them.

Leningrad was cut off from the mainland and so also from regular supplies of food, fuel and raw materials. The daily bread ration was 250 grams. The chilling cold, 174 hunger and savage shelling took a great toll of the people. The city transport was at a standstill, and Krasnaya Zarya workers who lived far away moved closer to the factory.

The winter was terrible. Many buildings, including the new apparatus shop, were burned down, their roofs and walls riddled with shell-holes, and the ground was littered with broken glass.

People were too weak to bury their comrades, but Yelizaveta carried on. She staggered up to the fifth floor, to the telephone cable shop, and forced herself to work--- persuading others to do the same.

``Walk, keep walking, at least a few steps at a time--- don't sit still,'' she would say. "That at least will keep up your blood circulation!''

In January 1942, another part of the factory equipment and the people were evacuated over the ice-bound Ladoga Lake. Yelizaveta was among the last to leave. In incredibly difficult conditions people transported machine-tools, instruments, materials and the work-in-progress. The Army was in need of telephone communications and nothing of value was left behind.

Yelizaveta, having barely recovered from her emaciation, continued to work as team-leader at the newlysited assembly shop. Right after the war, she returned to her native city to work at her old factory, where she made some rationalisation proposals. On the occasion of the city's 250th anniversary, she was awarded the title of Hero of Socialist Labour. In the course of her life, she had taught hundreds of young girls, many of whom, like herself, had subsequently become team-leaders and foremen.

Her life is like a bridge spanning the years of revolutionary struggle, the Civil War, the First Five-Year Plan periods and our own time, a period of communist construction. She had helped and guided the young generation along Lenin's way towards the goal illumined by his ideals and his heroic life.

Zakhar Dicharov

[175]

THE MOST IMPORTANT THING LIFE

[176] 199-9.jpg [177]

Lenin, May 1920

[178] __ALPHA_LVL1__ THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IN LIFE

I should like to tell those who are younger and they far outnumber my own generation, of the great happiness of having a truly big aim in life, and how empty and bitter life is without any set purpose. I personally did not come to understand the true purpose of my life easily or at once, but when I finally did I was filled with great contentment and happiness. I am particularly proud of the fact that my discovery was connected with the name of Lenin, with his ideas and teaching, and with the new society and human relations that were established with his participation and under his direct guidance.

I spent the lesser part of my life in the Soviet Union, for I started out in a completely different world. But first a few words about my father.

He, too, had a cherished hope, and was even fortunate enough to see it materialise---but that did not bring him happiness. Throughout his life, my father, Ignas Paleckis, a blacksmith from the Lithuanian town of Telsiai, strove to become a houseowner. There is a popular saying that "Honest toil will not get you stone mansions'', but my father, a man of great vigour and working 14 to 16 hours at a stretch in the smithy, decided to disprove the saying. It became an obsession and to bring on the day he kept the children on a starvation diet: he scrimped __PRINTERS_P_179_COMMENT__ 12* 179 and saved, and we ate musty bread and stale herring. But of the four children, only I survived. My father was building the house "for his children'', to provide for them---and they were dying because of it.

At last he managed to save up something. He got into debt and built himself a small two-storeyed house in Riga. He had seen that house in his daydreams and in his night dreams. Yet when it was there at last, it brought him nothing but deep disappointment. The house stood in a workers' neighbourhood, and his tenants were factory hands, all very poor and always behind with their rent. The dog-eat-dog law of the old world confronted my father with this inevitable alternative: he must either become a ruthless landlord and squeeze the last pennies out of the poor, or ruin himself and lose what he had acquired by hard work and abstention.

Among our tenants we had a man called Janson, a toyfactory worker and a Social-Democrat. In 1905 he had fought on the Riga barricades. This man was poor but full of robust confidence in his own strength and in the ultimate victory of the workers' cause, and my father often went to see him with his doubts and complaints. I remember that even as a boy I understood Janson's simple words about the class struggle and the need to change the existing order.

``Don't say that,'' my father would chide him. "The tsar is powerful, for God is on his side (he believed in God implicitly). What is the use of blowing against the wind?''

Years later I heard the oriental saying that "If all the people blow together there will be a typhoon''. Yet even at the time I felt that Janson and his fellow workers were right.

When my father died, I had to plot my own course, and I decided that I was not going to repeat his mistake: there was no happiness in money. But what was happiness? That I was to find out much later.

It is a pity that there was no one like Janson by me 180 in my youth. There was no one there to explain to me "whom to follow, on which side to fight" as the poet put it. I started out in a printing-shop as an ordinary hand, and later ran messages, clerked and did carpentry work. In my spare time I read indiscriminately, at first mostly detective stories. This was a cunning device to keep youth on a special diet: penny books about great-hearted crooks and nearly as greathearted detectives took young people's minds away from the struggle that mattered and discouraged thinking.

199-10.jpg U. Paleckis

The momentous year of 1917 marked a great turn in the fate of humanity and of us young people. At numerous stormy meetings after the overthrow of the tsar we heard gripping speeches that called the people to struggle. This made us look to more serious books.

I wish I could say that I was among those who had joined the young guard of the Bolshevik Party when I first heard of it. But that was not so. Like many thousands of my contemporaries who had not gone through the harsh but splendid school of struggle I, too, failed at the time to make the correct choice. There were then hundreds of parties and factions, vying with each other to win the allegiance of the man in the street, and virtually all had fancy names and programmes.

It may sound strange but I must confess that at the age of nineteen I was simultaneously a member of three parties. I heard that a national democratic organisation, the "Union of Lithuanians'', was being formed. "Am I not a Lithuanian and a democrat?" I reasoned---and 181 joined. Another day I was taken to a meeting of the party of progressives. There again the speeches were fine. "Am I not for progress?" I thought---and joined again. That night I attended a meeting of Catholics, who said they stood for socialism, because Christ had been the first socialist. Wasn't I a socialist? I remembered Janson telling me that socialism was good. In short, I was enrolled once again. I thought at the time that I had found my aim at last, and knew what path to follow.

However, some time later, to the joy of the national bourgeoisie, the Baltic countries were invaded by the Germans. That was when, like many of my young compatriots, I "cooled off" and was no longer so elated by slogans of "liberty, equality and fraternity'', for even a child could see that the words and deeds of the bourgeois parties did not tally.

It was at this time, "under the German occupation'', when my spirit was sorely tried and I was beset by doubts and disillusion, that I first heard the name of Lenin, a name that was to become a beacon for me and for millions and millions of other men. Judging by Lenin's enemies, by their accusations and style of attack, my more experienced comrades in captivity could tell that Lenin was a good man who stood for the people.

It was so important, in fact indispensable to find the forces in the world that could actually bring justice and happiness to ordinary people like my comrades and myself. With the establishment, in battle, of the People's Soviets throughout the Baltic area in 1919, the longsought-for solution to our most burning question seemed close at hand. With great feeling, as a young worker of the newly-founded Communist paper for Riga's Lithuanian readers, I translated the Manifesto of the 3rd International as if it were a poem. Lenin's words inspired us to fight for victory, which seemed close at hand.

But at the time the young Baltic Soviets failed to withstand the enemy onslaught. I recall the Riga of May 1919: 182 German regiments were marching through the city with the bodies of unburied killed workers left to lie in the streets as a measure of intimidation. The winners of the war----the British---prevailed upon the defeated German generals to stay in the Baltic area. The British and the Americans had hoped to liquidate the Soviet power there with the aid of German bayonets.

When the ``independent'' bourgeois republics in the Baltic were set up, some people had fresh hopes of a national revival. But soon afterwards the peasants, who had prided themselves on belonging to the same party as the President, came to realise that their "party comrade'', and "peasants' President" had doubled the size of landowners' inalienable tracts, and that foreigners---British, Germans, Frenchmen, Americans, Belgians and Swedes--- were in control of industry.

The ``independent'' republics of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia were sponsored by the winners of the First World War as a "cordon sanitaire" to ``cushion'' "the Red menace".

The bourgeois leaders shouted from the roof-tops that the Soviet power in these republics had been overthrown by ``national'' forces striving for ``freedom''. Actually, this had been done by foreign imperialists. The bourgeois armies of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia were very small: in Vilnius, -for example, the bourgeois leaders managed to enlist only 133 recruits during a period of two months.

In all three Baltic republics there was only a semblance of ``democratic'' government on Western lines. In Tallinn there was a State Duma and a ``Sejm'' in Kaunas and in Riga. Dozens of bourgeois and petty-bourgeois parties (35 in Latvia) each with its own platform and loud declarations, engaged in petty intrigue against one another. Among them were the Christian Democrats and the Liaudininkai (a variety of Socialist-Revolutionaries), Social-Democrats, the Peasants' Union and Socialists of other stripes. Except for their different declarations they 183 differed no more than the buttons of a uniform, a British one at that.

This was a time of bitter disappointment. Upon her return from America, the Lithuanian writer Julia Zemaite wrote: "I came to Lithuania but found that Lithuania was not there.'' A wave of suicides swept the republic. In almost every suicide note robust young people used the same two terrible words: unemployment and futility. The Communist Party---the only one that had consistently fought for the people's interests---was driven deep underground by the executions and solitary confinement of its members. The fascists were in power. But the Communists continued their struggle with great resolve and their illegal paper, Tiesa, urged the workers to prepare for battle.

I moved from Latvia to Lithuania and, scoffing at my old dreams, took to journalism, the writing of verse and the translation of Janis Rainis. I was flattered by my reputation of being a Left-wing journalist, and set great store by my act of protest, in once refusing to shake hands with Antanas Smetona, the fascist president of the republic. But when I later chanced to meet a young Communist girl I realised that it had been a poor, pathetic gesture. Late one night she knocked at my door and asked me to lend her my typewriter. She seemed to trust me and told me that her sister Marite had been arrested during the election on suspicion of conducting Communist agitation. There was urgent need to put out an appeal and to warn friends.

That night I wrestled with myself: "Who was working to give happiness to the people? Was it we and our outspoken and Leftist articles which the government apparently found quite safe, or was it these frail girls who were in the thick of a life-and-death struggle against fascism and who were prepared to go to prison and suffer torture for the great cause?''

Many Lithuanian intellectuals, like myself, were led to 184 the Communists by conscience and life itself. Those who had more courage and resolution joined the Bolsheviks to fight fascism. We knew how bravely one of the Lithuanian Communist leaders, Karolis Pozela, had gone to his death. We were deeply moved by the staunchness of Antanas Snietckus, another Communist, who had turned prosecutor at his trial and exposed the rotten regime. These were men who had a clearcut aim in life, who knew what they wanted and what they were fighting for.

Like many of my friends---the writers Salomeja Neris, Petras Cvirka, Antanas Ventclov---I sought contacts with Communists. We attended illegal May Day workers' meetings and wrote articles against the government. These were often mimeographed illegally. We were moved by a growing desire to start a direct struggle to change life in our republic. The Soviet Union was the beacon that illuminated our discussions of what we should be fighting for and what the new life should be like.

At last I came to the Soviet Union, Lenin's native land. The Second Five-Year Plan was in full swing. Full of hope and enthusiasm, the Soviet people deprived themselves of many everyday needs to build factories, power stations and state farms. We felt their pride as masters of all they produced by their labour, their confidence in the splendid future they were building not only for themselves but for all of humanity. They knew for whose sake they were surmounting the difficulties and bearing the privations.

How could I help recalling Lenin's prophetic words, which I had ``discovered'' shortly before, that "We, the Bolshevik Party, have convinced Russia. We have won Russia from the rich for the poor, from the exploiters for the working people.'' There was this country, convinced in its righteous cause.

We met people of different ages at the various factories of Leningrad, at the Moscow ball-bearing plant and the state farm Gigant. They were all different from us, the 185 youth in particular, in that they all pursued a clear and a splendid aim and were confidently marching along the path onto which Lenin had guided them.

After our trip to the Soviet Union, the land of socialism, we could not help feel how stifling the atmosphere was in Lithuania. Nothing had changed in Kaunas, Siauliai and Telsiai. The papers, for instance, still carried advertisements "Young woman with higher musical education seeks work as waitress'', or "Young man willing to do any work, anywhere'', etc. We heard of some of our friends going abroad, to Brazil, Argentina and South Africa---in search of luck and work. We heard whispered rumours of the desperate suicide note left by the young painter, Marcele Katiliute. People's poetess Salomeja Neris wrote at the time:

All paths were closed to us; Our native land, a prison, Hands tightly bound, And silence all around.

It hurt you to see the young people. The Roman Catholic Church had a death grip on all the educational establishments---schools, universities and the conservatoire. The clergy fished for young souls, who were prodded along the path from the ``cherubs'' of the Catholic children's organisation, to the ``Ateitininkai'' student organisation and onto the Christian Democratic Party. They did this with consummate skill: community choirs and amateur art circles with sanctimonious repertoires, and even sports competitions. Moreover, the "fishers of men" knew how to bend youth's natural love for romanticism to their own ends. Every boy-scout expedition, every camp-fire and basket-ball match were ultimately aimed at inculcating a fear of God and a respect for the powers that be.

Still we could not fail to notice that the will to struggle of those who opposed the anti-popular forces grew 186 from year to year. They were led by the Communists and the truth of Lenin's words surmounted all obstacles and reached the hearts of the people.

The Communists, among them such fine men as Karolis Didziulis, Vladas Niunka, Motejus Sumauskas, Chaimas Aizenas and Vladas Banaitis, whom I met while I was in the Dmitrava concentration camp, helped me to grasp the full power and wisdom of Lenin's ideas and to see the purpose of life. I shall never forget the splendid image of the brave and cheerful Sonia Glezeryte, our best singer in camp, who died a hero's death while carrying out an underground assignment during the nazi occupation.

The months of detention were an important schooling that supplemented my political education. I was sent to a concentration camp under the following circumstances. In October 1939 a manifestation was organised to praise the government's wisdom on the occasion of the return to Lithuania of its capital Vilnius. We explained to the people that it was not the government but the Soviet Union that had returned Vilnius to us and urged the workers to demand the overthrow of the government. Together with the participants of this manifestation--- which took such an unexpected turn for the government--- we the activists of the Communist-guided Popular Front went to the presidential palace and told Smetona what the people thought of him.

In the summer of 1940, our people sent us, deputies of the first freely elected parliament, the National Sejm, on a mission to Moscow to petition the U.S.S.R. Supreme Soviet to accept Lithuania into the Soviet Union's fraternal family of peoples. The Baltic republics were incorporated in the Soviet Union and rallied to the banner of Lenin for all time.

``There it is, the victory at last!" said the Lithuanian workers recalling the behest of their leader Karolis Pozela, who, just before his execution by the Smetona regime, wrote: "Comrades, I did my best for the cause, 187 and am about to die for it. I urge you to continue to struggle till victory.''

Thus, after years of struggle and painful quest we finally came to a clear understanding of our real aim in life.

In the very first few months after the victory of the Soviet system there were significant changes in the life of the republic and its people, particularly the youth. Those born since the Soviet power was established, find it hard to understand and appreciate the pleasant shock of surprise that our young people felt then on reading what today is regarded as a commonplace wanted advertisement: "Drivers wanted'', "Building workers wanted urgently'', "Factory needs metal-workers of all skills'', etc.

But what mainly determined the general attitude towards the new power was the people's sense of participation in everything that was being done in the republic. That is why the Lithuanian people, to a man, fought the nazi occupation forces during the Second World War, and yearned for the return of their own Soviet power.

By then every honest Lithuanian knew what he fought and lived for. Let me tell you the story, one of many, of a worker, Klemensas Zuta, from a small town called Sed. In the first week of the Sovet power, this retiring and hardworking man had spoken at a meeting, the first time in his life, of the joy of living with a Soviet sun in the sky. When the fascists came, this statement was used as evidence against him.

The prison warder, escorting Klemensas to his cell, asked him with mockery:

``Hey, Zuta, is the Soviet sun still up there?''

Zuta's comrades later said that at these words he straightened up and said calmly but firmly:

``It is, and will always be there!''

A group of fascists rushed into the cell to force Zuta to take his words back in the presence of his comrades. They shot him through the hand and asked:

188

``Is it up there?''

``It is!''

They tortured him for more than an hour, but he was firm:

``It is, it is, it is!''

Those were the words on his lips when he died.

Never will our country forget the heroic exploits of the Lithuanian partisans, such as the young Maryite Melnikaite, Heroine of the Soviet Union, who gave her life for the great cause.

We remember the departure for the front of the Lithuanian Division, which covered itself with glory in the heaviest battles against the enemy and fought its way back to Vilnius, to the ancient tower of Gediminas overlooking the city.

I remember meeting in the last month of the war, in an East Prussian town just cleared of the fascists, some young Germans who cursed Hitler for having mangled the fate of their generation.

This took my mind back to Berlin in 1936, when as a Lithuanian journalist I stood among the crowds of Germans lining the Unter den Linden and heard their wildly enthusiastic speeches. They were all highly excited, for they had just watched the drive-past of their Fiihrer, the ``genius'' who showed the German nation the way to the stars. I thought at the time: this blindness is pregnant with tragedy.

And so in 1945, in that small Prussian town battered by Soviet multi-rail rocket projectors I recalled the blazing eyes of the lad from the Hitlerjugend who was holding forth, from hearsay, on the mission Hitler had assigned to his generation. What a price the German nation has had to pay for a false, inhuman cause! Fortunately, the fascists were routed by the Soviet people, the most humane of peoples, and this enabled German youth to start a new life, inspired by the Soviet people's example.

189

I have travelled to Yugoslavia and Brazil, Poland and Japan, India, Mexico, Finland and many other countries, and for all the working people everywhere the name of Lenin is a symbol of hope.

In my meetings with young people in recent years I have tried to learn of their hopes and aspirations in frank and friendly talks. I discovered, for instance, that two young men---one, an Indian, Vishnu Dutt, who accompanied us to the Bhakra Nangal power project, and the other, a Montenegrin, Gojko Krapovic, whom we met in the Yugoslav city on the Adriatic seaboard---while living in different societies, they both, nevertheless, were fired by a common urge to create and not to destroy. Gojko, who had fought with the partisans from the age of 13 and had become a student of Belgrade University when the people's power was established, said to me:

``We are building communism. We are Communists, and the goal indicated by Lenin gives us the strength to move mountains. When I think of Lenin I forget the words 'insurmountable obstacles'.''

Abroad all Soviet people are asked about our rising generation, the young people whose lot it is to complete the implementation of Lenin's ideas. I am happy and proud to be able to speak everywhere about the wonderful life and deeds of our own Lithuanian youth and of all the Soviet young people. When I think of them today I want to repeat and repeat the following: remember that your happiness lies not only in your nation's wealth, which tomorrow will be even greater; it lies not only in your personal joys and successes, but above all in the fact that since early childhood you have known the great and splendid aim in life indicated by Lenin. Always treasure it!

Ustas Paleckis

[190] ~ [191]

A LESSON FROM LENIN

[192] 199-11.jpg [193]

Lenin, May 1919

[194] __ALPHA_LVL1__ A LESSON FROM LENIN

Since the early years of the revolution, Lenin has been that source of love and revelation which helped me to switch from Christianity to communism.

Here is a lesson he taught me.

1

I remember joining the Communist Party in the early stages of the Soviet Army's retreat in the autumn of 1941. There was something special, tense and alarming in the air. People were caught up in the war, like a house on fire, and it revealed each person's emotional state and X-rayed their character. As I received my candidate's card, I was told in general terms about the war, about patriotism and the duty of a Party member. The last was not explained in concrete terms, it was taken for granted, and in war-time seemed to be no different from the duty of every honest Soviet citizen and patriot. Yet when I walked out into the street with the cherished card in my breast-pocket, life itself immediately gave me a deeper understanding of this duty, and a clearer definition of my new obligations.

Although I had always liked to argue, when the pros and cons were there, I had never actually learned the art __PRINTERS_P_196_COMMENT__ 13* 195 of agitation. And now my first task as a candidate-member of the Party was to become an agitator and talk to people.

Moscow stood pockmarked with .camouflage protective patches on its buildings, window-panes plastered with strips of white paper, and sandbags lining the streets. The sky above was shrouded in the smoke of bursting shells, and whining sirens sent people into air-raid shelters. At dawn, you saw, swaying like a chunk of ice against the cold morning sky, the bluish-silvery aerostat spreadeagled over the squares. The familiar world was gone, and in its place was a vast bivouac, something that was transient, fleeting and unstable. Some of us writers were appointed agitators. It was our task to intrude into this vacillating world and immediately infuse into the people a sense of having their feet firmly on the ground, to convince them that the familiar forms of the Soviet power remained as solid as granite.

We had to speak very often: before half-empty auditoriums at the Polytechnical Museum, in cinemas before the showings of films, and in the packed marbled corridors and platforms of the underground when the air-raids wailed. In the respites between professional duties--- writing for the papers, the Sovinformbureau, and the factory newspapers, and talks as agitator which generally occurred during the night raids, I read eagerly the books I found at hand. They were editions of the thirties, reminiscences of Lenin by workers of the Comintern and by his wife, Nadezhda Konstantinovna Krupskaya. I very much wanted to find out and get a feeling of the communist qualities that had made Lenin leader of the international working-class movement, and had earned him the love of humanity. I wondered what traits in his character we should learn to imitate, and in general, what, apart from convictions, distinguished a real Communist from the man in the street.

A person's behaviour is predetermined by his character, which embraces a whole complex of qualities that may 196 influence you to trust and respect him and want to follow him; this is not a product of the mind, for it goes deeper than the mind, and it somehow links up with the image of the person you yourself now have to be.

199-12.jpg M. Sbaginyan

The first thing I wanted to find out was how Lenin spoke in public, what lesson there was for an agitator to learn from his art of swaying and convincing men. General phrases would hardly be of any help; nor would the ordinary definitions contained in numerous articles and books and even eye-witness accounts of his speeches be of much help either; the idea explaining Lenin's method could only be conveyed through some concrete example illustrating some definite feature. In this respect, I found a gold mine in a little booklet, printed on cheap yellow paper, giving the impressions of foreign Communists during that perplexing period of the 2nd International's collapse and of the initial stages of the 3rd International.

Men who had heard many Social-Democrat speakers, among them such Social-Democratic ``classics'' as the venerable August Bebel, were surprised when they first met Lenin in person. They all had a yardstick from their experience of various types of orators, but they all had to admit that Lenin was different.

197

A very interesting description, for example, of Lenin's report at a meeting of the All-Russia Congress of Soviets, held at the Bolshoi Theatre, is given by the Communist Sen Katayama, who was there. He had arrived in Soviet Russia from Mexico in December 1921, and knew no Russian at all; consequently, he did not understand a single word of the report, but his eyes took in Lenin's manner of speaking and the rapt attention of the audience. What he saw was so novel that he was neither bored nor tired although the report lasted for more than three hours.

This is how he described the scene: "Comrade Lenin spoke for about three hours, showing no signs of tiredness, and almost without change of intonation, steadily elaborating his ideas, setting forth one argumentation after another, as the audience sat breathlessly, drinking in every word. Comrade Lenin did not resort to rhetorical pomposity or any kind of gesticulation, but he had charisma; when he began to speak, there was absolute silence and all eyes were focussed on him. His gaze took in the whole audience, as if hypnotising it. I noticed that no one moved or coughed throughout those three long hours. The whole audience was carried away. Comrade Lenin is the greatest orator that I have heard in my life.''

But this is still very much generalised. If Lenin's manner of public speaking impressed Katayama as being novel, we too find his perception somewhat unusual. For to us, to millions of Soviet people, Lenin's image---vividly impressed on our minds by our painters, sculptors and actors---is inevitably associated with his sweeping forward gesture. But Katayama says he did not resort to "any kind of gesticulation'', and stood motionless before his listeners; what is more, he hardly changed his intonation in the course of three hours. The Soviet ear finds Katayama's description of Lenin "hypnotising his audience" not only strange but unacceptable.

Let us try to analyse what it was that amazed Katayama in Lenin's oratory. He himself said that he knew no 198 Russian, and so could not understand a word of the report. What was it then that gave him the impression that Lenin was "steadily elaborating his ideas, setting forth one argument after another"? Obviously, while Katayama was unable to follow the meaning of what Lenin said, he must have felt the conviction his words carried. He felt that their impact did not flag even for a moment, and this suggested that Lenin was steadily developing his ideas. The fact that Lenin's audience listened with unflagging attention implied that Lenin was putting forward fresh argumentations, without any boring repetitions. Having seized upon this chief characteristic of Lenin the orator, Sen Katayama involuntarily translated his image into a visual picture. Hence Katayama's description of Lenin--- who was always so full of animation---as a motionless statue with a monotonous intonation unchanged in the course of three hours.

But Katayama also used another definition, to which he gave the reader no explanation whatsoever. He said that Lenin had ``charisma''. To shed some light on the secret of Lenin's charm as an orator of the masses, something Katayama asserted without adducing any proof, we must think of the most authoritative Communist orators of the day with whom Katayama could compare Lenin.

Among the reminiscences of theorists and practitioners of the revolutionary movement it is hard to find (and there is no reason to expect) any writings that verge on the artistic. Yet Felix Kon in his recollections of Lenin at the Stuttgart Congress of the 2nd International in 1907, probably quite unintentionally left us an almost artistic portrait of Bebel. I, who had lived in Germany for many years and had for a time studied at Heidelberg, found that portrait simply a revelation, for I was well acquainted with what was incomprehensible to the Russian: the German tendency to show marked respect for rank, for the official, for the uniform. August Bebel, the highly esteemed leader and "general of Social-Democracy'', arrived at the 199 Emacs-File-stamp: "/home/ysverdlov/leninist.biz/en/1967/LOL318/20061230/299.tx" __EMAIL__ webmaster@leninist.biz __OCR__ ABBYY 6 Professional (2006.03.0) __WHERE_PAGE_NUMBERS__ bottom __FOOTNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [*]+ __ENDNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+ Stuttgart Congress. There was no idolatry in the German Workers' Party. Lenin himself wrote eloquently in this connection: "The German Workers' Party at times corrected opportunist errors even on the part of such great leaders as Bebel.'' But the higher circles of the Social-Democratic party had borrowed some of the traditions of bourgeois diplomacy. Thus, ``receptions'', ``teas'' and round-table meetings were held to ascertain views and establish friendly contacts. "At Stuttgart such a banquet was organised in the countryside,'' wrote Felix Kon. "Beer, wine and diverse delicacies paved the way to 'closer contacts'.''

``At the banquet, Bebel, as the keeper of tradition and the most authoritative leader of the 2nd International, made a solemn round of all the delegations, addressing them all with the word 'Kinder' (children), joking with some in a paternal manner, chiding or admonishing others. A surrounding band of admirers, men and women, added to the solemnity of this procession. . ..''

This is a vivid picture: Bebel was indeed "a great leader" (that is how Lenin had called him, and that is how students of my generation, then tackling the "agrarian question'', remembered him) and what I am now going to say is not meant to be derogatory. Yet when a person takes his personal superiority among his contemporaries for granted and tries to combine it with a condescending democratism, implying a benevolent disposition to say a kind word to each of his inferiors---then this " democratism" tends only to accentuate the existing difference between position and ``rank'' of those concerned, as in this instance, between the one making the round and those honoured by it. The idea of "not offending anyone" implies an assertion of the superiority of one person over another and this attitude has become traditional among the higher circles of Western Social-Democracy. But can we imagine Lenin making a gracious round of the delegations like a kind general? The very suggestion is absurd. Nor can we 200 imagine him surrounded by a band of admirers. Lenin's ``charisma'', which held the attention of the hundreds who breathlessly heard his report, was based on some other quality. What was it?

Let us turn back from the Stuttgart of 1907 to the Munich of 1902, of which we have recollections by Lenin's wife. A loyal associate of Lenin's, she, like Lenin, had a deep respect for Plekhanov; and when in one of my works (The Thornton Factory) I mentioned Plekhanov's name alongside Takhtarev's, she corrected me in a letter, pointing out that whereas Plekhanov was one of the founders of the party, Takhtarev was only a "fly-by-night revolutionary''. And here is what she recalled about the founding of Iskra.

``Workers from Russia often came to Iskra, and each naturally wanted to see Plekhanov. Getting to see him was much more difficult than us or Martov, and even when a worker did get to see him, he came away with mixed feelings. Plekhanov's brilliant intellect, knowledge and wit impressed the worker, but all the impression he carried away was of the vast gulf between himself and that brilliant theoretician. The things that had been uppermost in his mind, the things he had been so eager to talk to him and ask his advice about, had remained unuttered.

``And if a worker disagreed with Plekhanov and tried to express his own opinion, Plekhanov would get angry and say, 'Your daddies and mummies were knee-high when I. . . .' "

Here we have another surprisingly concrete description of a character. Plekhanov himself was well aware of his brilliant wit and polish, and he derived a personal pleasure from these qualities, the kind of personal satisfaction an actor derives from a splendid performance. During the sharp dispute with the Rabocheye Delo group in Zurich that ended in a rift everyone was highly excited. Martov 201 worked himself up to such a pitch that he "even tore his tie off''. But Plekhanov ``scintillated''.

Recollecting this, Nadezhda Krupskaya put the finishing touches to her picture: "Plekhanov, on the other hand, was in high feather. The opponent he had been grappling with for so long was at last worsted. Plekhanov was cheerful and chatty.'' Thus, if Bebel revealed the German taste for tradition, which verged on naivete, Plekhanov, in his striving for self-satisfaction which the Russians call "knowing one's own worth"---manifested not a naive respect for rank but the individualism of a big talent who saw his own ``how'' before the other's ``what''. Still we have come only a little closer to explaining Lenin's "other quality" as a speaker. Again we must go from book to book, this time to the impressions of a Scottish Communist, to find the exact definition at last.

The Scotts are a stubborn people with a remarkably stable national character that has remained unchanged for several centuries. When we read the recollections of William Gallacher, delegate of the Scottish Workers' Committee to the Second Congress of the Comintern, we visualise the characters in Smollet's novels, although they lived in mid-eighteenth century. Gallacher is just as straightforward and sharp, his speech is free from wily diplomacy, his criticism is based on intelligent observation and natural common sense. Without the slightest embarrassment and even somewhat proudly, Gallacher had admitted that at the meetings and committees which drafted the theses that had imparted such tremendous significance to the second Congress in the history of the Comintern, he personally "had proved to be of no help''. As to the reason why, this is how he put it:

``I came to Moscow with the conviction that a rebel from Glasgow knew far more about revolution than anyone of our Russian comrades, and this despite the fact that they were then involved in one; I immediately strove 202 to guide them along the 'right' path on a whole number of questions. ...''

There is not the slightest doubt that Lenin liked Gallacher's Scottish self-confidence, for with him, as with us, it must have evoked some literary reminiscences and awakened his natural sense of humour. Gallacher, with his inimitable frankness, further recounted that he became extremely irritable due to the "unfamiliar conditions of nourishment" and this had made him very touchy. When he learned that Lenin had ridiculed him in his work LeftWing Communism---an Infantile Disorder, he virtually pounced on him:

``I tried to convince him that I was not a child, and was 'an old hand at this game'. Many of my remarks were more outspoken than are expressed in normal English.'' This means that Gallacher had pounced on Lenin in his native Scotch, spiced with mustard and pepper, and quite unlike the ordinarily conservative English. Thus we can draw a mental picture of the furious Scotsman letting loose against Lenin a ``Clydeside'' tirade. Lenin appeased him with a short note, saying: "When I wrote my little book, I hadn't met you.'' But he remembered the Scotsman and his phrase: that his remarks "were more outspoken than were usually expressed in normal English''. And some time later when another Communist, Willie Paul, visited Russia, Lenin described Gallacher's attitude and probably repeated it to him with quite a creditable Scotch accent, saying, "Gallacher said he'wis and awl haun et the game.'' To conclude his account Gallacher said, that according to Paul, Lenin had uttered the phrase with a splendid Clydeside accent.

We must be very grateful to this Scottish Communist for this precious little bit of humour on Lenin's part. But we are indebted to Gallacher for much more than that, for it was his keen perception which enabled him to note and point out most exactly the basic characteristic in Lenin's manner of address. He wrote: 203 ``I had visited Lenin at his home on two occasions and had a private conversation with him. I couldn't even think of him when he was talking to me. The remarkable thing about Lenin was the complete subordination of self. His whole mind, his whole being, was centred in the revolution. So when I spoke to Lenin, I had to think not of him, but of what he was thinking---about the revolutionary struggle of the workers.''

Here, at last, is something to hold on to. To see Lenin face to face, hear his voice, and meet his eyes, and yet feel oblivious of the man himself, hearing only the content of his words, with all the attention focussed not on the ``how'' and the ``who'' but on the ``what''. Lenin was a speaker who could subordinate all his thoughts to his subject and by the power of his convictions and the deep meaning of his thoughts make his audience oblivious of his own person and concentrate on the essence of what he was saying.

I can imagine two different types of reaction evoked by two different types of orator. First there is the orator who is congratulated and praised: "That was a splendid report you gave!" Then there is the orator who arouses the natural reaction to speak at once not of his manner but of his subject, which had captivated the minds of the audience. Having marked off Gallacher's unsophisticated but penetrating words with a little red cross, I made the following deduction for myself: if the audience starts to praise you after your report, it's a sure sign of failure. If, on the other hand, there is an immediate discussion of the subject-matter of your speech, as though you yourself were not there at all, you can consider yourself having done a good job. That was the first lesson I learned from reading during the air-raids, and since then, in my work as an agitator, I have always visualised Lenin the speaker before me and tried to get my audience to discuss the content of what I had said. Even when you fail to achieve much the memory of the lesson is most precious; keeping 204 it in mind helps to put into a realistic perspective any outward effect you may achieve.

2

This was the first step in apprehending Lenin's qualities as an agitator. But the secret of the great love he commanded among the millions---a love that went down to the heart---still remained undefined. True, there was an obvious difference between the respect with which August Rebel's band of male and female admirers flocked after him (they undoubtedly loved Bebel and were loyal to him), and---what you might call the lack of respect with which people jostled forward just to look at Lenin and be near him for a little while. Clara Zetkin, who had often seen such meetings in Moscow in 1921, recalled:

``When Lenin visited me, everybody in the house made high holiday---from the Red soldiers who kept watch at the door to the young kitchen girl, not to speak of the delegates from the Near and Far East who were being put up at the very spacious country-house where I was living. . ..

``Vladimir Ilyich has come!

``The news flew from person to person. Everybody was on the look-out, gathered into the large hall or by the house door, to greet Lenin and nod to him. Their faces expressed the keenest joy when he went over to them, greeted them with his warm smile, speaking a few words to one or to the other.

Not a trace of humility, let alone servility on the one side, not a taint of condescension or affectation on the other. Red soldiers and workers, employees and Congress delegates . .. they all loved Lenin as one of themselves, and he felt himself as one of them. They were all one in the feeling of warmest brotherhood.''

These words convey nothing new; for everyone who had ever described a meeting with Lenin in person had 205 invariably pointed out his simplicity of manner and comradely cordiality in associating with people.

When the first edition of Lenin's Works was published, there was as yet no far-flung network of organised political studies with a widely worked-out programme of reading material, where there are references on every question to many Marxist classics, but with the relevant pages only indicated. I consider it my good fortune that I was able, at the end of the twenties, to read Lenin's works volume after volume, each work in its entirety, instead of taking in little bits. True, as I had no senior comrade to ``guide'' me along in my reading I often focussed my attention on matters of secondary importance and failed to notice some of the major points. Still these details later proved very useful. One of them, which drew my attention in the very opening pages of Materialism and Empiric-Criticism helps one, I think, to understand this very important point: the interconnection between the individualism of a person's character, and his inclination to reason his way towards theoretical idealism. Lenin very much liked something Denis Diderot said, and in his polemic with Ernst Mach he quoted it in full. Judging from the footnote, Lenin had apparently read Diderot in the original and had translated the quotation himself. It dealt with Diderot's discussion with Jean d'Alembert on the nature of materialism. Diderot asked the latter to imagine that a piano was endowed with a capacity for sensation and memory. Then comes a moment of madness. . . . Diderot uses his famous phrase: "In a moment of insanity, the piano---capable of feeling--- imagined itself as the only existing piano in the whole world and that it completely embraced all universal harmony in itself.'' This image of a sensitive piano---on whose keys (as though they were its organs of perception) played the objective world, that is, materially existing nature, and which suddenly went insane, imagining that it alone contained all of the universe's harmony--- 206 impressed Lenin so strongly that he not only quoted it a second time, but even elaborated it, brought it nearer to us and showed it from a slightly different angle. Diderot emphasised the idea that the piano imagined that all the universal harmony took place within it. Lenin, ridiculing "the naked" Ernst Mach, wrote, that if the latter renounced the existence of objective reality independent of us, then he was left with a "naked abstract" Ego, with a capital E, which was nothing but the "insane piano which imagined that it alone existed in the world''. It would seem that this was again the same quotation from Diderot, and yet it was not, for Lenin had equated the mad piano and the Ego. He centred attention not on Diderot's second idea (that the "mad piano" imagined itself the creator of all harmony in the universe as the bearer of the entire objective world within itself, as subsequently Hegel's "Universal Reason'') but stressed Diderot's first idea only, that the "mad piano" imagined itself to exist alone in the world (Lenin left out the second half of the phrase not to distract the reader's attention). Lenin converted Diderot's first idea into the Ego. But when this Ego becomes the centre of the world and exists all alone what happens to poor ``you'' and all the other cognising subjects? Does not every ``ego'' become actually insensible to the existence of every ``you'' and do not these ``you'' appear to it as mere figments of its own imagination? Thus, from George Berkeley's extreme theoretical solipsism, a bridge is unnoticeably formed in the mind of the reader to the development of an extremely practical individualism in the character of a person, which prevents him from feeling the existence of other fellow humans with the same intensity as he feels his own.

Understandably, all these reasonings are very subjective, but they contain a grain of truth. Lenin was so strongly conscious of the real life of other people because of the plenitude of his materialistic consciousness. And no one could help feeling the sincerity of Lenin's approach to 207 them as equals and responding to it. The totally novel quality of our epoch lies in the materialistic experience of the existence of the ``other'' person with an equal intensity as that of the ``ego''.

Has the reader ever experienced the extraordinary happiness of associating with a person whose approach is an expression of that equality which comes from his ``ego'' sensing the reality of your ``ego''? This is not so commonplace in our life. People differ in everything---not only in their station in life but also in endowments, intelligence, character, age and attractiveness. But they are absolutely equal in one respect, and this is that they all exist in reality. In the presence of the living Lenin---and even in the mere reading of his works---everyone felt the vibrant joy of the asserted reality of one's own existence, irrespective of how small or insignificant it may have seemed to him personally. I think that this is one of the main reasons why people liked being with Lenin, and he with them. J. Fainberg, a member of the British Socialist Party, who came to Moscow in 1919, said it was a special sense of inward freedom: "Whatever the sense of veneration and respect one may have had for Lenin, one immediately felt at ease in his presence.'' This means that in associating with Lenin one strove to show the better sides of one's character, or, to put it more simply, became a better person.

3

A scientist, even a great one, may be a hopeless psychologist who is oblivious of the people around him, talks through them, and takes black for white, and still may not be called to account by humanity. For in spite of all this, he may stimulate one to learn from him, to work and grow alongside of him day by day; he may teach one great concentration of thoughts, and inspire awe by his lifetime devotion to a chosen field. But a 208 Communist, especially if he is a leader of men, cannot display a lack of interest in men, for it is his task to know their moods and aspirations. To say that he is a poor psychologist, is tantamount to saying that he has failed in one of his main tasks.

Of course, one has to be born a Lenin to be as great a psychologist as he was, with a world outlook based on his vast materialistic consciousness. The total absence of vanity was a primary property of his temperament. He had as real a sense of the existence of others as of his own being. In this respect, we can strive to imitate him all our lives, and even if we utterly fail in our aim, this striving will become our conscience, our most reliable criterion in the appreciation of character, our own and of the people around us. At any rate, every Communist can learn to use, or should at least have a knowledge of, Lenin's many purely pedagogical methods, in particular his method of constantly studying men.

Lenin's skill of approaching a person, understanding him, getting him to do what was necessary, teaching him or giving him a lesson, developed in the course of his constant and tireless work with men and as a result of his passionate desire to be with men and feel them. He was never indifferent to men or inattentive to their immediate needs. But apart from his practical experience in working with them, he always tried to learn of their fundamental psychology from literature. Krupskaya told us that in Cracow he missed good fiction very much and read a ``loose-leaved'' volume of Anna Karenina over and over again. For a hundredth time he read the novel in which Tolstoi's favourite hero, Levin, expounds his peasant philosophy, and which contains such a splendid cross-section of Tolstoi's own contemporary society, giving a natural and artistically true picture of such terrible men as Karenin, whose soul is exposed in all its coarseness! These are characters of a different society and a different epoch. The extensive schooling in psychology, __PRINTERS_P_209_COMMENT__ 14---2330 209 which true literary art offers, was a great help in Lenin's understanding of men.

Lenin was well aware that every nation expresses itself very forcefully in its own tongue, and his constant study of other languages helped him very much in his work with men. For some reason our propagandists have given this very little thought. But it is obviously a great handicap for a politician to maintain contact with workers of other nationalities through interpreters, or to travel to foreign lands without being able to read a public notice, let alone a newspaper. It is like standing before a locked door without a key. Lenin always wrote, when filling in questionnaires, that he had a poor knowledge of foreign languages, but here is what some witnesses say:

``Comrade Lenin had a good understanding of and spoke English.'' (J. Fainberg.) Lenin "spoke English fluently''. (Sen Katayama.) "In his speech at the 2nd Congress of the Comintern, in 1920, Lenin criticised the errors of the leadership of the German Communist Party and the line pursued by the Italian Communist, Giacinto Serrati. When dealing with the German Communist Party, Lenin spoke in German. Later, when dealing with Serrati's errors, he spoke in French. I happened to attend the sitting which took place in the Andreyevsky Hall of the Kremlin Palace. I remember the hum that went through the hall: the foreign comrades could not believe that the Russian who had just spoken so freely in German was just as fluent in French.'' (Y. D. Stassova.)

He also had a good knowledge of Italian. Through the study of a language Lenin gained a deeper understanding of what might be called the inner gesture, a people's character, peculiar reactions and sense of humour; he sought for the best methods to enhance mutual understanding. To his last day Lenin also showed an interest in the fraternal Slav languages and continued studying them as much as time and opportunity permitted. Just as Lenin's knowledge of English, German and French 210 enabled him to establish immediate contacts with foreigners, so his knowledge of the Czech language and customs also served him in good stead. Antonin Zapotocki arrived in Moscow in the summer of 1920, and in agitation and some confusion looked forward to meeting Lenin, wondering how and what they would talk about. However, his fears were soon dispelled.

``To begin with,'' he wrote, "it turned out that Lenin understood Czech. He opened the conversation with a question that would have hardly taken aback any Czech. He asked me whether the Czechs still relished their traditional knedliki with plums, a dish he had learned to like during his stay in Prague. ...''

On another occasion, when the Bulgarian Communist Khristo Kabakchiev arrived in Moscow, he presented Lenin a stack of brochures in Bulgarian, of which he was very proud, for he thought they gave an idea of their mass political literature. Ordinarily, one's interest in a gift of books soon wanes at the sight of an unfamiliar language. But not in Lenin's case, and we can readily imagine the interest with which he eagerly examined them.

``Is Bulgarian hard to learn?" he suddenly asked Kabakchiev, and it was not idle curiosity either. Lenin asked the latter to send him a Bulgarian-Russian dictionary as soon as possible. Some time later, apparently having despaired of getting one from Kabakchiev, he wrote a note to the librarian asking her to get him one.

Thus Lenin went from the study of foreign languages to the study of peoples until his last day.

He devoted great attention to young people, and taught others never to shy away from them. He always kept in touch with the young people, and knew how to spare their dignity. His wife described how he would help beginners and young authors, without their being aware of it. But the main thing was his remarkable gift of selfcontrol (a quality in which he had probably trained himself); he never showed irritation over other people's 211 errors. Whenever he dwelt on some person's negative qualities, he would never fail to mention some of his positive ones. Willi Munzenberg, an organiser of Swiss youth in the first decade of the century, wrote, after working with Lenin: "We were never offended by his criticism. We never felt repudiated, and even when he criticised us most severely he always found something in our work that merited his praise''. Munzenberg said this was a pedagogical approach, that is, one designed to educate young Party workers. He wrote: "Without Lenin's direct and personal comradely help, given with tremendous pedagogical tact, the International Youth Bureau in Zurich would never have been able to contribute so largely to the youth movement from 1914 to 1918.'' He ends his recollections as follows: "In the course of my 15 years' work in the socialist youth movement, I received an infinite amount of help from the most eminent of leaders in the working-class movement, but none of them, either human beings or politicians, stood closer to or exercised a greater political influence on proletarian youth than Ulyanov-Lenin.''

Let me add that Lenin always drew attention to a person's best qualities, and this is one of the principal features which is indispensable for a teacher, and therefore also for a Communist, who works with men. A Communist must base his educational work with men by relying on their best---not their worst---qualities. Nadezhda Krupskaya wrote: "Lenin was always taking a fancy to people. He would notice some valuable quality in a person and focuss his attention on him.'' In early May of 1918, a group of Finnish comrades who had made many serious mistakes and had suffered a complete defeat in their Party struggle were making their way to Lenin. Their glum faces expressed an awareness of the gravity of their failures, and they expected to be severely reprimanded. But instead of reprimanding them, Lenin embraced them and began to console and encourage them; 212 he turned their thoughts to the future and spoke to them about what they should do next.

There are many similar examples, and they make you feel that there was more to Lenin's tactfulness than mere kindness, for, when necessary, he could be ruthless. One of Lenin's most effective instruments in educational work with men was his ability to awaken and strengthen their sense of dignity. He particularly liked to associate with people possessed of this feeling. They were mostly Russian workers who came to see him when he was abroad, peasants who walked clear across the country as delegates of village communities in the early years of the Revolution, scientists and workers in the arts. Lenin valued very highly the British workers' spirit of independence and studied them almost passionately during his stay in London. Nadezhda Krupskaya has some burning pages about this period. After church, ordinary British workers would have debates, and Lenin went from church to church to hear them speak. He scanned the newspapers for announcements of workers' meetings, and would attend them, no matter how far he had to travel; he frequented workers' readingrooms, rode on top of buses, and visited a "Social-- Democratic" church where the clergyman was a Social-Democrat. Visitors to London generally came to know only the upper sections of the British working class, which was bribed by the bourgeoisie, but Lenin studied the ordinary British worker, the son of a people who have had several revolutions, have gone through Chartism and have produced Habeas Corpus, that writ of personal liberty.

A worker's class instinct, fostered by the mighty feeling of unity with his group through day-to-day work with them, is closely linked with a sense of personal dignity and is incompatible with toadiness, ingratiation and cowardice, or with brazen self-confidence, for that matter. There is a world of difference between the calm and dignity of the human being, and the self-centred yanity and impudence of the egotist.

213

I have quoted several examples of Lenin's treatment of men who were conscious of their errors and needed encouragement for future work. But here is the more complicated example of an apparently very promising writer and political functionary who had to be spared from general condemnation by such an authoritative organ as the 3rd Congress of the Comintern and so preserved for the Party. He was the German Communist Paul Levi, and I believe that Clara Zetkin's description of the episode in her Reminiscences of Lenin is so instructive psychologically and pedagogically that it ought to be memorised. This was more than forty years ago: objective historical analysis has effaced all the complexities, minute details and the whole concreteness of the situation (1923), and Levi himself has left the historical scene as a notorious renegade and opportunist. But, then, forty years ago, all this was not so obvious. The facts appeared in a somewhat different light, and Levi himself had not yet developed into an opportunist; he held a leading post in the young German Communist Party, and by far not everyone was able to see the full duality of his stand. This is why---- with the war on---the Levi episode made such a strong impression on me, especially when described by the experienced German Communist.

An event which had then stirred all sections of the Comintern was the upsurge of the revolutionary workers' movement in the German city of Mansfeld in March 1923. This was followed by the organisation of guerrilla detachments in the district, and a series of clashes with the police in other towns. All this was incensed by unbearable oppression on the part of the factory-owners, the stationing of police in the factories, searches and arrests. Today, it is quite clear that those outbreaks had been provoked by the "bourgeoisie with the aim of defeating, the advance detachments of the workers piecemeal before they got fully organised. There was then another glaringly obvious side to the scene in Mansfeld; the 214 movement was undisciplined, poorly planned and incapably led, without the necessary contacts with the working masses---in a word, the movement was doomed to failure, and was sharply criticised by most Communists. Levi launched his bitter criticism of the movement when it was at its very height. He gave a mass of true facts, and appeared to be theoretically right, but let us turn to the discussion between Lenin and Clara Zetkin.

Clara Zetkin was worried about Levi's fate. She knew that despite the truth of his criticism, the Comintern took a negative attitude towards him and many of its sections, particularly the Russian, censured him and wanted to issue a public reprimand and expel him from the Party. She had some very warm words in his defence. She told Lenin, "Paul Levi is not a vain, complacent litterateur. He isn't an ambitious political climber. . . . Paul Levi's intentions were most pure and unselfish ... do what you can to keep Paul Levi among us.'' She spoke as though she anticipated the accusations against him and denied them in advance. But Lenin did not accept her challenge; he did not dwell on the light accusations she had refuted. He spoke of Levi (as Clara Zetkin describes it in her verbatim narrative) as though he was thinking out loud--- very seriously and with a strong desire to make a full analysis and gain a thorough understanding of what had taken place in its entirety---not so much of Levi himself, as of the Party mentality in general.

``Unfortunately,'' Lenin said, "Paul Levi has become a special case----I believed that he was firmly bound to the proletariat, although I was aware of a certain coolness in his attitude to the workers. Since the appearance of his pamphlet I have had doubts about him. I am afraid that there is in him a strong inclination towards self-analysis and self-admiration---something of a writer's vanity. Criticism of the 'March action' was necessary. But what did Paul Levi give? He tore the Party to pieces. He did not criticise, but was one-sided, 215 exaggerated, even malicious; he gave nothing to which the Party could usefully turn. He gives ground for the suspicion that he lacks the spirit of solidarity with the Party. And it was this that ired many rank-and-file comrades, and made them deaf and blind to the great deal of truth in Levi's criticism, particularly to his correct political principles. And so a feeling arose---it also extended to the non-German comrades---in which the dispute concerning the pamphlet, and concerning Levi himself, became the sole subject of this contention, instead of the false theory and bad practices of the 'theorists of the offensive' and the 'Leftists'.''

The Comintern had not yet pronounced its verdict on Levi, but Lenin's careful thinking shows us the whole of Levi, as one who has doomed himself to expulsion from the Party because he had broken his solidarity with it.

Lenin's words contain much more than that which has a direct bearing on Levi. It is the warmth with which he speaks of the workers rising, arms in hand, against their masters: for unsuccessful, indisciplined and harmful as their uprising was to the common cause, it was still an uprising, in which those who had made the mistake shed their blood---and it was precisely they who should not have been condemned in the light of the general plan of the revolution, because without such mistakes there could be no victorious uprising. Levi failed to understand this, but his "rank-and-flle comrades"---who did not take "a cool attitude" to the working masses---did, and that explains their indignation over his criticisms.

Levi's subsequent fate revealed with what amazing exactitude Lenin had described this man in just a few words. Lenin, in order to arrive at his own opinion, was able to look at things from the standpoint of the "rank and file''. He never kept his distance; he always remained close to the people, and felt he was one of them.

At the very end of the book, which I used to take with me to the air-raid shelter, is this story.

216

At the end of October 1923, it looked as if Lenin was recovering from his stroke, and when on a Sunday he was visited by Ivan Skvortsov-Stepanov and Osip Pyatnitsky, he came out to meet them leaning on a cane in his left hand. Here is how Pyatnitsky describes the visit:

``Comrade Skvortsov began to tell Lenin about the elections to the Moscow Soviet. Lenin listened without much attention, now looking at Skvortsov, now glancing at the titles of the books on the table at which we sat. But he was all attention when Skvortsov began to enumerate the corrections to the mandate of the Moscow Soviet proposed by the factory workers---the electrification of the worker neighbourhoods where the poorer population lived, the extension of the tram lines to the suburbs, the closure of pubs, etc. He made his remarks in such a tone that we clearly understood---that the proposals were business-like and correct, and that everything should "be done to them.''

His glancing at the books on the table when listening to the account of the elections revealed his inattention, because the elections were a foregone conclusion. But when it came to the voice of the working masses and their needs, his interest was deeply aroused.

Pedagogics is the science of the growth of man, and it deals with that in him which takes shape, develops and improves. The old ideas of kindness fail to cover that which Lenin displayed in his approach to people, and which made them shine in his presence. Lenin's ethics were deeply rooted in his dialectical materialist consciousness, his world awareness; they are the ethics of a materialist for whom all other beings are as real as he is himself. He believes in this being of others, in their growth, and their viability. There is more to this than the old idea of kindness, and men responded to Lenin with what was much more than mere reciprocation for ordinary kindness.

Marietta Shaginyan

217

A LESSON FOR LIFE

[218] 299-1.jpg [219]

Lenin, July 1920

[220] __ALPHA_LVL1__ A LESSON FOR LIFE

The fast diesel train pulled up impressively and stopped at a reserve platform of the Rizhsky Railway Station in Moscow. Several passengers alighted from the elaboratelytrimmed and large-windowed glittering coaches. Instead of leaving the platform they went to the motor coach, which seemed to be still vibrating from its fast run. They mounted the steps and entered the driver's cabin, whose bulging windscreen looked out on the maze of lines running away into the distance.

The first Soviet diesel train, Baltika, had arrived in Moscow after its test-run from Riga where it was built. On it were only designers, constructors and technologists, who were preparing it for its final test by the state commission. They were making a thorough and detailed assessment of the test-run showings: they examined and checked the state of the various metering devices, the still warm diesel engine, and its auxiliary units.

The oldest man in the group showed the greatest enthusiasm and naturally stood out. Rather tall and lanky, he climbed the upright ladder quite like a young man, and peered into the most unlikely nooks and corners.

He did not look old, and although there was silver in his grey hair, his eyes sparkled. Still there was 221 something in him that told you he was much older than he looked.

From his colleagues I learned that his name was Pyotr Yakobson. He was an engineer with half a century of experience behind him, and had taken part in building this locomotive. He was winner of a State Prize, a candidate of technical sciences, and worked for the AllUnion Institute of Railway Research. He was well over seventy.

I got to know him, and soon became a frequent visitor at his house. We talked about the past and his long career as a railway engineer. He told me it was Lenin who had suggested the idea behind his work.

I wrote down his most interesting recollections. To some extent they give a picture of the intricate lines the Russian technical intelligentsia had to travel to reach the Revolution, and of the great attractive power of Lenin's far-sighted projects for a radical reconstruction of backward Russia and the rapid development of her economy, science and engineering.

AN OLD ENGINEER'S STORY

~

HALF A CENTURY AGO

In 1963 it was 50 years since the memorable day I received my diploma at the Polytechnical Institute in St. Petersburg. In its dry traditional style it ``certified'' that Pyotr Yakobson, a student of the Mechanical Department, was being awarded the title of mechanical engineer which entitled him to Grade 10 in any appointment to "a post on government service''. It further stated that engineer Yakobson was authorised to hold the post of teacher in special educational establishments and to be in charge of factories.

It is a happy period when you finally strike out on your own and take your place amidst the people's diverse activities! It is a joyous one, when you work in a chosen 222 field, one which commanded the dreams of your youth and the exertions of long years of study.

The wonders of early twentieth century engineering caught my imagination when I was still at school. We were just as crazy about the early planes as boys today are about spaceships.

299-2.jpg P. Yakobson

At the Polytechnical Institute, our youthful enthusiasm was channelled to a purpose and our attention was focussed on internal combustion engines ---then the latest thing in engineering, particularly the latest model named after its inventor, the German Rudolph Diesel. Diesel patented his invention and designed his first models in the 1880s. Because of some flaws, they were not in use for a long time and only towards the end of the century was the diesel engine finally improved at the Nobel factory in St. Petersburg. It operated reliably on crude oil, and all the doubts about the future of this type of engine were dispelled.

I first saw a diesel engine at the institute laboratory. It caught my fancy immediately---it was like love at first sight---and determined the sphere of my interests in engineering for many years to come. I would often stay on in the laboratory for hours after classes, taking it apart, and putting it together again and regulating the units. The curriculum was saturated, and we had to take up to a hundred oral examinations. But throughout my 223 college years my enthusiasm for diesels did not flag and I followed all the modifications in their design. I became a confirmed dieselman, and my diploma thesis was "Power Plant on Diesels".

Half a century has elapsed since then. I am now taking part in designing fast trains with a modified diesel traction. They differ from the early diesels as modern cars from vintage models.

This may seem to indicate exemplary consistency in a chosen field, but my path was neither straight nor smooth.

Men of my generation experienced the impact of the Great October. Revolution of 1917, which changed the whole world. I was then a young man but with already established interests as an engineer. Like many men of my age I often found myself at the crossroads, wondering which path to take.

It was no simple matter for an engineer, without clearly established political views, to side with the Communist Party which was taking the nation along a difficult path. At first, I had doubts and engaged in gloomy reflections on the future of my country and myself. If I was able to overcome them and to go along with the whole people, it was because I was guided by Lenin's wise words and deeds, his concrete and always exact directives on the most diverse aspects of life, and his bold project which opened up vast possibilities in my own field. I am still guided by Lenin's vision.

THE PATH WE CHOOSE

Although my diploma gave me extensive rights in managing factories, I started out modestly, at the St. Petersburg Water Works. My salary was 75 rubles a month. Russian engineers were paid less than their foreign counterparts. The only reason why I chose to work at the water works was because of the power plants in its shops, 224 which showed me the technological developments in this field: the units there ranged from the slow vertical Watt steam engines to internal combustion engines.

But I did not work long in that ``museum''. It was 1914. The World War broke out, tsarist Russia was in it totally unprepared, as everyone realised a few months later. There was a shortage of arms and ammunition, and news of the heavy defeats at the front aroused the people's indignation against the disgraced and bankrupt tsarist government. On the initiative of the State Duma in 1915 war industry committees were established to boost war production. The industrialists on these committees took advantage of the situation. They managed to secure government subsidies and other privileges for the munitions factories. Everywhere primitive handicraft workshops were reconstructed and turned into munitions factories, and engineers were switched to them. I was given the task of reconstructing the small Pelle factory owned by Gukasov Bros. & Co., some 25 kilometres from Petrograd. The big oil magnates missed no chance to make money on war supplies.

I worked at the factory until the October Revolution. I had many worries: shops were under construction and equipment arriving from Britain had to be installed. By mid-1916, the factory employed about a thousand workers. My work consisted not only in supervising the reconstruction. The manager, a businessman, took no interest in the technical side and was rarely seen at the factory. As his assistant, I had to settle many conflicts with the workers. In reconstructing the factory, the owners had made no provision for workers' living quarters of any kind. Some of them took lodgings in the neighbouring villages but many lived in dilapidated barracks that had once belonged to an old brick works.

The workers often came to me with their just complaints about ihe terrible living conditions. I did all I could for __PRINTERS_P_225_COMMENT__ 15---2330 225 them but my powers were limited. The owners made great profits on the manufacture of arms but were reluctant to spend any money on improving the workers' living conditions. My reports were ignored, and I was told to mind my own business, and worry about the technology.

I spent more and more time at the factory, often working through the nights and on Sundays. Despite the hustle and bustle of everyday work, I could not help noticing signs of an impending revolutionary outburst. Petrograd was sombre and tense. Consumer and industrial supplies dropped off sharply. The workers' fighting spirit was mounting, and we at the factory felt it too. Most of the workers there had been born and bred in Petrograd, and had been sacked from big plants in the capital for revolutionary activity. The police knew this but could do nothing because of the labour shortage.

Our workers maintained constant contact with revolutionary organisations in Petrograd. Often, as I walked through the shops at night, I saw groups of workers in heated discussion. Whenever I approached, they would shower me with questions, apparently in an effort to find out my mood and political views. They knew that I was well disposed towards them.

Strikes broke out in early 1917. Many a time on my way to the railway station I saw workers' demonstrations in Znamenskaya Square, and was once caught in a skirmish.

The February Revolution did not help ease the tense situation in the country, and after the first few months of general rejoicing, the existing irreconcilable contradictions within the bourgeois Provisional Government began to reveal themselves ever more sharply. Guided by the Bolshevik Party, the workers were preparing to take over in deciding Russia's future. In this period Lenin's name was heard at workers' meetings more and more often.

226

Several workers came to my office and said that all the factory workers intended to go and welcome Lenin, who was expected at the Finlyandsky Railway Station in Petrograd. They invited me to join them.

Today, everyone understands the tremendous significance of Lenin's return to Russia for the victory of the Revolution. I was fortunate to witness that momentous event and have tried to recollect every possible detail.

At the railway station, however, our factory workers were unable to assemble together, for as news of Lenin's arrival spread through the city, crowds of people flooded not only the station square but the surrounding area. By eight o'clock, I managed to make my way into a lane that led from the Military Medical Academy to the railway square; from there I had a view of the railway station but could not get any closer to it myself.

The hours dragged, until at last, at about midnight, we heard the hooting of train whistles and shouts of "Hurrah!''. In the dim light we could just make out the silhouette of an armoured car and the figure of a man on it. It was Lenin.

The house I lived in in Suvorov Avenue had one of its walls facing the square before Smolny Institute, the seat of the headquarters of the revolutionary proletariat. And again, without clearly realising the historic import of the events, I witnessed history in the making.

On the night of October 25, 1917, there was an uncommon crowd in Suvorov Avenue. The Smolny's windows blazed and you could hear the rumble of trucks and armoured cars.

I can add little to the many detailed descriptions of this historical day. I simply wish to emphasise the complexity of 'the path traversed by the intelligentsia on its way to active participation in the revolution. I was a mere onlooker in those historic days---Lenin's arrival in __PRINTERS_P_227_COMMENT__ 15* 227 Petrograd, and the revolution on October 25, 1917---one who was trying to understand what was happening and who had no realisation of the significance of these events for humanity and for myself personally.

But I was faced with a choice virtually the next day after the October Revolution: should I sit on the fence as many specialists did at the time, or come down on the side of the revolution and go along with it?

ON THE WAVES OF THE REVOLUTION

It is hard to foresee the path of a person who is subjected to the complex impact of diverse forces, particularly in the turbulent years of a revolution, which toppled old foundations, traditions and customs.

What were the latent forces that prompted me---an, engineer who had always stayed away from politics--- to give my strength and knowledge to the young revolution?

There were many factors that influenced my decision: I recalled how in 1905, in my early years, together with fellow pupils from the Omsk high school, I took part in a workers' demonstration and listened to the. Bolshevik Valerian Kuibyshev; I remembered my student years at. the Polyteehnical Institute, with its strong progressive traditions, and my years of work at the factory with revolutionary-minded workers. Then there was the powerful logic of Lenin's speeches, most of which I read in the newspapers, and some of which I heard at meetings.

What was decisive was the comradeship offered by the workers of the Pelle factory, who recommended me for the Supreme Economic Council, which had just been set up on Lenin's idea,

I had but a vague idea of my future work there and had no inkling that I was about to embark on a long and difficult path which would open before me vast expanses 228 of creative work in engineering, or that one of Lenin's brilliant projects would take me back to an early interest in this field. The Supreme Economic Council began to operate early in December 1917. It was assigned to work under Comrade Lengnik, a prominent Party functionary who headed the Metal Department.

Those were hard times. There was mounting dislocation and the threat of foreign intervention. An onlooker saw nothing but chaos, and even many of our Council workers were at first often in confusion.

I was given the assignment, for example, to investigate the state of affairs at the Taganrog Steel Mill and the Russian-Baltic Works which had their head offices in Petrograd.

Towards the end of November, there was a decision to nationalise these factories and to place them under Soviet management which was to consist of three other engineers besides myself and two workers. A talented worker, G. Shabliovsky, was elected chairman of the board.

We were soon swamped with current problems. I remember even having to examine, quite seriously, a claim from the chapter of Kazan Cathedral for the continuation of a grant they had been receiving from the old board. Gradually, however, we came to understand more clearly the Soviet Government's ideas for restarting production and breathing life into the dying industry.

My work on the National Economic Council soon came to an end. Events developed rapidly and in March 1918 the Government and the Council moved to Moscow. Circumstances compelled me to stay in Petrograd and so I was given a job at the Petrograd District Railway. That was the start of my 50 years in transport.

At that time railways were a key factor in the national economy, for on them depended the possibility of moving supplies to the cities and of transporting troops. This had 229 to be done at all cost, but the means at our disposal were scant. The rolling stock and locomotives were run down, the workshops and repair depots were in a state of dilapidation and discipline was low. Special commissars were appointed to supervise the key lines.

The Extraordinary Commissar for the Northern Front railways, which included the north-westerly and northeasterly lines leading from Moscow right up to the Kolchak front, had his headquarters in Petrograd.

In my capacity of railway engineer attached to this office I visited all the sections of the Northern and Eastern fronts, and together with repair teams followed in the wake of our army advancing against the Kolchak forces, restoring damaged bridges, railway tracks, rolling stock and locomotives. I also made a number of trips to the Western Front.

This was a hard but exciting period. There was cold, hunger and typhus, and we lived through the lot. I recall a great deal, but I want to tell of what impressed me most of all at the time: it was one of Lenin's projects which gave body to my visions of the future and showed me the great scope of the creative endeavour of the victorious revolution.

On New Year's Eve---1920---I was in Omsk, in the city of my youth, where I was sent by the People's Commissariat for Railways to work at the railway depot, the largest in the east. The Civil War was drawing to a close and there was much laborious restoration work ahead to get the railways going again. Even a confirmed skeptic would hardly overestimate the complexity of the task. The rolling stock was ravaged by wear and tear, there were great locomotive dumps near the depots. There were no spare parts or metal, and so the dumped engines were ruthlessly stripped of everything that could be used.

I wondered where to start? How much could one achieve with ceiling wax and string methods? Was that my job, 230 anyway? Was I right in abandoning the line in which I had been trained?

As I thought of all this, I recalled a discovery I had once made at the Putilov Works, when I was still with the Petrograd District Railway. One day while inspecting some repaired locomotives I noticed an internal combustion engine of unusual design lying in a heap of scrap metal. Later, I learned that it had been designed and built by the outstanding Russian engineer and scientist V. I. Grinevetsky, who, before the war, had tried to develop a diesel locomotive. I had not heard of his project at the time, but the discovery of his engine revived my earlier interest. I wondered if I should make inquiries whether the manufacture of diesels was being resumed?

In the autumn of 1921, when I still had my doubts, I was suddenly summoned to the People's Commissariat for Railways.

EMERGENT COEXISTENCE

The overcrowded Omsk-Moscow train was making slow headway along the recently repaired tracks. The stops were long and frequent, and at junctions it took hours to change locomotives. Around me I saw illustrations of my thoughts about the sad state of the railways. I wondered again what should be done for a start to revive and resume the steady flow of traffic, and restore the ruined economy and industry.

I least of all expected to find an answer to this tormenting question upon my arrival in Moscow.

There I at once learned at the People's Commissariat for Railways that I had been included in a group going to Sweden and Germany to accept delivery of steam engines ordered by the Soviet Union.

The GOELRO (State Commission for the Electrification 231 of Russia) plan, the first socialist plan to restore the national economy, was of tremendous significance, and Lenin's decision to purchase abroad 1,700 steam engines and several hundred tank waggons, was, I think, the most outstanding economic step taken in that direction. Frankly, I could hardly believe it when I first heard of it. To think that we should have 1,700 locomotives, when the restoration of two or three was considered a great accomplishment. But it was only abroad that I gained a broader understanding of the economic and political implications of Lenin's grand plan.

We were to blaze the path for Lenin's policy of coexistence, which became the corner stone of the foreign policy of the world's first socialist state for decades to come.

Some day, a full history may be published of this country's economic ties with the capitalist states which then encircled it. It was very hard to establish them.

I set out for Germany via Pskov, a city near the Latvian border, where I arrived towards evening. All the other passengers went home and I found myself all alone at the station. My appearance must have been ungainly: I wore a rusty old top-coat and carried an old wicker basket, a relic of my student days. I must have cut a rather suspicious figure, I thought, particularly in a border area. A railroad official came up to me. He could not conceal his astonishment when I told him that I was going abroad; but a glance at my passport and credentials somewhat enhanced my prestige with him.

I was allowed to stay in some service quarters, and my passport and credentials were taken from me, possibly as a precaution. I slept soundly on a wooden bench, and in the morning boarded a locomotive. The border crossing formalities were simple: a Latvian official took my documents and escorted me into Latvia.

It was four years since the October Revolution, and 1921 was drawing to a close, but only abroad did I come 232 to feel its universal significance. I noticed the keen interest with which people there followed developments in our country---the new Russia---the Soviet Russia. Anyone carrying a Soviet passport was regarded---with hate or with sympathy---as a plenipotentiary representative of a mysterious country.

On the Riga-bound train a group of drunken thugs, learning that I was a Soviet citizen, insulted me in every way and threatened to throw me off the train. But ordinary people on the train and at the Riga Railway Station were very friendly and eager to learn everything about the Soviet Union.

I stayed abroad for more than two years. I examined locomotives in Sweden and Germany, from such large firms as the Krupp Works in Essen, Hanomag in Hannover, and Humboldt near Cologne. The Soviet engineers on this mission worked hard, for we all realised how important it was for the restoration of our national economy to ensure the timely delivery of the locomotives so sorely needed by our transport. And the best reward was news from home that factories, mines and railways were once again beginning to hum.

I was once summoned to Stockholm, where by then the mission had its headquarters, and invited to accompany Professor Graftio, who had arrived in Sweden to order some turbines for GOELRO's first project, the Volkhov hydropower station. Lenin's electrification plan was becoming a reality.

By now the whole world has realised the lasting significance of the policy of coexistence, which is the fruit of Lenin's genius. But even at that time, almost 50 years ago, when the first steps were being taken towards the policy, Soviet engineers working abroad sensed its beneficial effects which had a real impact on the socialist economy and men's minds.

Imagine the amazement of the Germans and the 233 Swedes: Communist Russia, for which the capitalist press had predicted inevitable disaster, had not the least intention of going down. It was even placing huge orders for locomotives, tank waggons and turbines. Many a capable head wondered what was going on in that country?

The attention of local workers and engineers was always focussed on us.

I stayed in a small Swedish town Falun for a relatively long time. There, not only the workers and engineers, but even people from the neighbouring settlement sought to make our acquaintance. In the evenings, people would call at the house where I lived just to talk with me. Till late at night we would carry on a conversation in broken German-Swedish and the topics were invariably Soviet Russia, developments there, and Lenin.

During the lunch break, the designers would often come and sit in our office. They were in a position to know that the Russians were worthwhile customers who met their obligations, whose sole concern was to restore their national economy, and who did not engage in subversive activities but sought friendship with all peoples.

The initial successes in Soviet industry and especially Lenin's plan for the electrification of the country were a great inspiration to all engineers who had thrown in their lot with the revolution. There was still a great deal to be done to restore the war-ruined economy and industry, but already we had glimpses of the vast vistas with no end of creative work in the technical reconstruction of our national economy.

We were confident that the time was not far off when Soviet industry would be producing its own---and superior ---locomotives powered by diesel engines. We were deeply impressed by our chief's accounts of his frequent meetings with Lenin and of Lenin's great interest in producing 234 a diesel locomotive. I remember his talks in every detail, for they gave me an insight into Lenin's perspicacity and style of work.

Those of us who had heard many eye-witness accounts of Lenin's interest in the prospective diesel locomotive, recalled his words: "The Russian Revolution can do anything.''

The designers in our group who were led by the talented Russian engineer, Nikolai Dobrovolsky, started to blueprint locomotives, but naturally took account of earlier projects by such outstanding Russian scientists as Yakov Gekkel and Vassily Grinevetsky.

Our chiefs informed Lenin of our new projects. He had not forgotten about the idea; if anything, he was more enthusiastic about it than before.

A DREAM THAT CAME TRUE

In January 1922, on Lenin's personal instructions, the Council of Labour and Defence adopted a decision to start the construction of diesel locomotives in the Soviet Union.

Few people at the time realised the full importance of this decision, but to me it will always remain a momentous event which determined my future for many years to come.

Although the diesel locomotive was not as important for the economy as GOELRO's electrification plan, for many engineers and scientists the diesel locomotive plan must have appeared just as fantastic as the electrification plan. Here is why: Just after the turn of the century, eminent Russian scientists like Grinevetsky, Gekkel and Shelest, yearned to see Russia lead the technical revolution in transport, and be first in replacing steam engines with the more economical diesel locomotives. They had several projects and tried to get the old specialists to see 235 the advantages of the new machines, especially in sprawling Russia where many railways ran across arid and barren terrain. They failed. And because some companies abroad had not succeeded in making such locomotives, there was a general feeling that this was a problem of the future. It therefore seemed highly unrealistic for a technically-backward country like Soviet Russia, just emerging from ruin, to rush in where the leading capitalist countries feared to tread.

But it took Lenin to see the kernel of the as yet imperfect Russian projects which were to work a technical revolution in railway transport, until then one of the most stagnant areas of world technology.

The diesel locomotive story is an example of Lenin's range, energy and assistance. Simultaneously with the building of the first diesel locomotive in the Soviet Union, two others were ordered in Germany to Russian blueprints. The money was available less than a month after the Council of Labour and Defence decision. Lenin found time to follow the construction work, and many of the urgent problems were solved with his help.

An office for the construction of Yakov Gekkel diesel locomotives was set up in Petrograd. The prime contractors were such famous plants as Krasny Putilovets, Baltiisky Sudostroitelny, Elektrosila and Elektrik.

We were in high feather. We were tremendously proud of the fact that backward Russia had orders for diesel locomotives in Germany. Russia was producing the last word in locomotives. This was a real breakthrough.

Many people yearned to take part in building the first Soviet diesel locomotives. For me, it was a new start, and gave me a real opportunity of combining the two lines of my engineering interests: diesels and railways.

When I returned home, I worked for some time at the 236 Oktyabrskaya Railway Administration until the arrival of the German-built diesel locomotives whose performance and exploitation I was assigned to test and study.

Naturally, I was above all interested in the minutest details of the first main-line diesel locomotive then being built in Petrograd, where work on Lenin's assignment was proceeding at a pace that would appear creditable even today.

I shall never forget the seventh anniversary of the October Revolution---the first one after Lenin's death. The days of mourning, when the entire nation grieved over the death of its leader, were still fresh in our minds. Many things reminded us of Lenin, and of his plans and ideas. On November 6, 1924, the eve of the national holiday, the world's first diesel locomotive, built by Soviet people on Lenin's assignment, ran on the tracks of Oktyabrskaya Railway Station. On its fresh paint was the clear inscription: "In memory of V. I. Lenin".

The following day, the locomotive made its first short run with prominent Leningrad workers and engineers on board.

The beautiful locomotive in its fresh coat of paint, gave much food for thought: there it was, the embodiment of Russian engineering genius, in which the capitalists and the tsarist government had failed to take an interest. Lenin had helped to retrieve their shelved projects and to accomplish « bold technical feat in a country that was just emerging from incredible ruin to take the lead in one of the most important areas of technical progress. What an inspiring start for scientist and engineer! What a pity that Lenin did not live to see all this. It was his idea.

Many years later, when the first atomic icebreaker built in Leningrad set off on its first trial run and when the early sputniks and spaceships broke out into space, I recalled that first diesel locomotive at the Oktyabrskaya 237 Railway Station---for it epitomised Lenin's style and farsightedness which were adopted by Soviet scientists and engineers.

Soon afterwards the two diesel locomotives built in Germany to our blueprints arrived in Moscow one after the other. I started to work on the first one as development engineer. My dream had come true.

Forty years had elapsed since then, and all this time I have been working on their improvement. For diesel locomotive builders, these were years of intense struggle to secure recognition for the new locomotive's advantages. There were many happy days when we felt we were making headway, but there were also periods when we felt alarm for the fate of Lenin's idea.

The first diesel locomotive depot in Lyublino did much to promote the training of construction and operation personnel, all enthusiasts of the new locomotive. In 1927, the depot was visited by a group of prominent American specialists who arrived with the express purpose of ascertaining whether the Russians had really built powerful main-line locomotives. The West was skeptical. The visitors made a thorough study of the locomotives in motion and undergoing repair and showered us with questions. They had to offer their congratulations. But it was only years later, when the Soviet Union had acquired much experience in the field of diesel locomotive construction, that foreign engineers, including Americans, acknowledged the importance of diesel locomotives on railways.

Of course, in technology the last word today is outmoded tomorrow. In the recent discussion in the press on the relative advantages of diesel and electric locomotives, most specialists came down in favour of the gas-turbine locomotive.

Diesel locomotive men believe that it will serve transport for many years yet, but we are peering into the future and assessing all the novelties. Once we are 238 convinced of the advantages of some new model, we shall do everything to put it on the rails. That is the main lesson in Lenin's support of the Russian engineers' bold diesel locomotive project. For me that was a lesson for life.

Alexander Belov

[239]

DREAMS CONE TRUE

[240] 299-3.jpg [241]

Lenin at the testing ground of the first Soviet electric plough. October 1921

[242] __ALPHA_LVL1__ DREAMS COME TRUE

No matter how young I feel, my grey hair testifies to my age, and my memory---which has retained the traces of numerous events---promptly reminds me that I am an eye-witness of two epochs. Many a path has been traversed, much has been left behind, like the markets on a caravan route, much has been experienced and accomplished. But I sometimes still think that I am just getting on my feet, and that much still needs to be done to reach the desired summit. Such, apparently, is human nature, and each day of our splendid restless life always brings along something new, filling man with fresh vigour to carry on and on.

Man's hopes and aspirations are diverse. Once, I would have considered it a great happiness to own a horse and a small snug cart-drawn tent to keep out of the cold and wind. There, I imagined, I could play host to my friends, conversing over bowls of tea, or mount my horse and gallop out to Mari, a hundred kilometres away.

Nowadays I travel very much, but even a plane, to say nothing of car and horse, no longer seems fast enough, for values change with time. Today I find myself a welcome guest in many distant parts of the Soviet Union and in picturesque India, distant Africa and many other countries, where I am welcomed as an old friend. This fills me with a desire to speak not only with my neighbour but to commune with all the writers of the world __PRINTERS_P_243_COMMENT__ 16* 243 and to discuss with them humanity's future. The past has not lost its fascination, but I feel now that I must go beyond Mari, for in my yearnings the caravan routes have given way to cosmic paths leading to the Moon and other planets.

Perhaps I should come down to earth from my flight of fancy, but who in our day can tell the limits of man's possibilities? The Soviet people have established a society on earth the like of which humanity has never known. They have blazed a path into space---and, because they are armed with Lenin's immortal teaching, there are no limits to their accomplishments and dreams.

I recently visited Tedzhen, the town of my youth, where I had my first hopes and disillusions. I was invited there for a big holiday by Yusup Kurbanov, chairman of the Kalinin Collective Farm, who had just been awarded the title of Hero of Socialist Labour.

As we sat in his house discussing cotton yields, the big construction projects in Ashkhabad, the American aggression in Vietnam, a gay mixture of laughter, song and dutar strains drifted in from the yard together with an appetising smell of national cooking. Most of the people present there were young; only two were my age, and one of them recalled the Civil War, an episode of his struggle against the whiteguard detachment in which there were some British mercenaries.

``They wanted to deprive us of all this beauty,'' he said with a wide significant gesture, and we know what he meant, "but they failed. We certainly made it hot for them.'' When he said ``we'' I looked at the others. But for the two or three men who had lived through that period, the others were not among those who had stood at the cradle of the Soviet power in Turkmenistan during the Civil War. I wondered if the young remembered their elders?

Next to me sat a handsome young man whose whole appearance and expressive burning eyes reminded me of 244 his father---Nedira-aga. He had slaved for the bai all his life, and in return had never had his fill even of the low-grade grey bread. When the Soviet power was established in Turkmenistan he put aside the hoe and took up the rifle. Somewhere between Dushak and Takyr the wind had long since effaced the mound that once marked his grave. There were so many others who had given their lives for the happiness of the present generation. No, indeed, posterity has not forgotten and never will forget them.

299-4.jpg B. Kerbabayev

Amasha Gapan, the village where I lived, was some fifty kilometres from the city. It was a common Turkmen village, a wretched human habitation. Tilled fields stretched south and west of it; to the north, almost bordering with the tents, rose the sand-dunes, like a grey host of sombre and indomitable warriors spawned by the merciless Kara Kum Desert; to the east, all the way out to beyond the horizon lay the lifeless salt plain, its chappy palms extended to the sun.

Our god-forsaken village, as the old men called it, was a collection of monotonously similar black tents. We had eleven people in our family, and today you wonder how so many human beings could be crowded in such shabby dwellings made of half-decayed sticks and covered with what once used to be felt. These tents used to be white, but were now covered with a thick layer of soot. Except for a few bai dwellings, all the others looked alike.

Grandfather Ovezklych was the head of the family and although he was then past 90 he was still on the go. He loved to tell the young people old stories and he himself 245 was a walking piece of history. The old man would shake his head reproachfully as he watched a passing village elder or a tsarist official swinging his inevitable whip.

``I spent my childhood and youth in the sands tending the bai camels,'' he would say. "I never wore headgear or footwear. The soles of my feet were so thick that I could walk through the scorching sands up to 40 kilometres a day. My clothes were tattered and I drank water from the irrigation ditch that watered the bai's cotton fields; my stomach rumbled all day long from hunger. And what was the reward I got from the bai? 'You son of a donkey,' he would say, and those were his kindest words, backed up with whip lashes or cudgels.

``The work dried up my strength, as gnawing mice dry up a tree by nibbling at its roots. I fought in battles against the Shah of Iran and the Khan of Khiva. I went off to the wars but what did they get me? Nothing but countless wounds.'' He pointed to a deep scar on his neck, and then showed us a lean shin with a small round bump on it. "These are not donkey brands but marks of battle. The scar on my neck was left by the sword of a kizylbash who nearly let the soul out of me, and the bullet still lodged in my leg hit me when I swung my horse round to go to the aid of a friend lassoed by a Khiva bandit. I have seen much in life, but because I was poor I have never been given a place of honour among respected people.''

My father was an excellent farmer who knew where and what to sow, and how to irrigate the fields. His advice was sought not only by fellow villagers but even by Russian engineers. But we stayed poor and owed many debts; yet in comparison with other countless families who could afford only one hot meal a week, we were relatively well off, for we cooked food every other day and sometimes even had guests. The farmer had a hard life, and the memory of it saddens even today: day in and day out he slaved under the scorching sun, watering the 246 fields with his sweat and fertilising them with his tears. But for all his inhuman exertions he got barely a tenth of the crop; the rest went to the greedy bai, the tsarist officials, the clergy and the money lenders.

There was no school in the village, or anyone who could read or write, nevertheless my father was firm, "I can't afford it for all, but one of us must learn to read.''

I was a weak boy and this made me a natural choice. Father said, "You are of no use here anyway. You can't even lift a spade. I think you will find the pen more handy than the sickle. Let's hope you will learn to read and write, and will be of some use to the family.''

He took me to another village which had a school and put me up with some friends. But I must have changed schools ten or so times before I learned to read and write.

The first of these was a mud-walled hut which was always full of smoke; it was supposed to go out through a hole in the ceiling felt, but did not, and there we sat, eyes thin slits and smarting.

We had no books, pencils or paper. We sat on the bare mud floor and wrote with wooden sticks on small waxed boards.

When a father took his son to school, he said to the teacher, as tradition required, "The bones are mine---the meat is yours.'' This meant: "You can beat the boy all you want, short of crippling him.'' So we were beaten with and without cause. It would be too long and too dull to recollect everything.

The start of the First World War brought additional distress to the poor farms. In addition to the existing taxes, horses, camels and clothing were requisitioned, and of course, the burden of all these levies fell on the poor. A poor family would be deprived of its only horse, while herds of the bai's thoroughbreds were left untouched. The people starved, while the bais and officials revelled.

Soon the people put two and two together. They stepped up their active class struggle. Driven to despair by the 247 hunger, the poor attacked bai caravans and even citadels. The 1916 uprising was particularly massive.

The following year was terribly harsh. There had been no rain at all and the earth was as dry as bone---the crop failure was complete. Nature seemed to be adding the last straw. Then, like a bolt from the blue, came the news:

``The white tsar has been toppled!''

I could hardly believe my ears. By then I could read and write, and understood Arabic and Persian. I felt the urgent need of learning Russian and began visiting Tedzhen more often in the hope of meeting people who were in some way connected with the Revolution. That was when I first heard of Lenin.

I returned to Shaitan-kala. Shaitan, by the way, means devil. I don't know why people gave it such a name. Perhaps because the mill there was set in motion not by water, wind or camel, but by some force the ignorant farmers found mysterious. And although the name of the citadel was retained after the Revolution it was a different place, a gathering place for those who welcomed the changes in life.

I was brought to Shaitan-kala by my friend, Karaja Burunov, who subsequently became a poet like myself. He was a city man, knew Russian and understood current events better than I did. But once when I asked him some questions which he found difficult to answer clearly, he said to me:

``Let us go to Shaitan-kala. I will introduce you to a man who can explain everything.''

My first impression of the man, Shamseddin, was not a very favourable one. Bearded, uncomely and his eyes red with tiredness, he hardly looked the man who would know everything. He was a mill mechanic but everybody called him foreman. What struck me in his room was the stacks of Azerbaijanian, Turkish and Russian newspapers and journals.

Shamseddin had an assistant, Akmurad Amanov. Later 248 he and 1 became friends and worked together to set up the Soviet government in Tedzhen. He noticed my skeptical look and whispered to me:

``Don't let his appearance mislead you---just listen to him talk. He understands everything that's going on in the world! He came here less than a year ago, but look at the number of people he has already enlightened. To tell you the truth ... he escaped from a Baku prison and his real name is not Shamseddin. The danger is now past, and he plans to return to Baku. That's a pity, isn't it?''

I shrugged my shoulders.

``Perhaps, I hardly know him.''

``You will, though,'' Akmurad said with meaning.

I expected Shamseddin to read me something of a sermon, as a mullah-teacher would, but he did not. Instead, we had a heart-to-heart talk over tea. He gave me a good picture of the condition of the farmers and I wondered why these simple truths had never occurred to me.

``The farmers say,'' Shamseddin concluded, "that they see no difference between the tsarist government and the bourgeois government of Kerensky, and they are right. What difference does it make if you are beaten with a whip or a stick---you get hurt just the same. Do you care whether your bread is snatched from you with the left hand instead of the right---you go just as hungry. A government with the same policy as that of the tsar will not last long: you cannot cross a river over a broken bridge. I think there will soon be another revolution---a real one this time, a revolution by the whole people. A great man has said so.''

There was a pause, each one of us turning Shamseddin's words over in his mind. Karaja Burunov then told me under his breath of a scandalous incident at the railway club two days ago. A count who had arrived from the district centre urged the people to support the war effort against the Germans. Shamseddin spoke out against him; 249 he exposed the real causes of the war and told the count he could not expect anything from the people. The count flew into a rage and shouted, "Who are you to talk on behalf of the people?" "I am a worker,'' Shamseddin said, and the way he said it you would think he was the emir of Bukhara, no less. Then he added, "Down with the bourgeois government! Long live the people's power!''

My opinion of Shamseddin was changing, Akmurad nudged me with his elbow and asked:

``Did you understand whom Shamseddin meant when he spoke of the great man?" "Lenin?" "Clever!''

Shamseddin must have heard us.

``Yes,'' he said, "I did mean Lenin. He returned to Petrograd from Switzerland recently and when his comrades offered their congratulations on the revolution, he said, 'This is no time for congratulating. We must prepare for another revolution.' That is how things stand, comrades.'' "Usta-aga, have you ever seen Lenin?" I found myself asking Shamseddin.

``No, I'm afraid not. But I have spoken to people who had seen him, and I have read many of his books.'' From a drawer in his desk he took a dog-eared book. "This is one of Lenin's works and it is called The Right of Nations to Self-Determination. I was sentenced to prison for reading Lenin's works and for retelling them to others. Soon Akmurad will take over and continue to enlighten you.'' At the time, there was a lot of idle talk about the Bolsheviks. The clergy asserted that they wanted not only to make the poor equal with the rich, but also to commonise everything, including families, and make people live like cattle. Others said this was a lie, and that the Bolsheviks wanted to establish justice in the whole world. I could not judge who was right, and asked Shamseddin about it. He looked me straight in the eyes and said: "Someone's been tampering with you, hasn't he?''

250

``I have been listening to both sides,'' I answered.

``Then you must've been inattentive,'' he said. "If you were told, for example, that the Bolsheviks would harness a camel to a cart back to front, would you believe it?''

``No, I wouldn't.''

``There you are---because that would be unnatural and impossible. And if you were told that cotton would be grown in the tent instead of in the fields, would you believe that?''

``Of course not.''

``Then why do you believe in malicious and stupid rumours? The Bolsheviks are people like us, except that they think more of others than of themselves. Why should they do what is unnatural and contrary to the interests of the people when they are fighting for the welfare and happiness of all poor farmers! I am a Bolshevik myself and am proud of it. I am sure that both you and Akmurad and other comrades, too, will soon come to understand everything for yourselves and will also become Bolsheviks fighting for the interests of the people. This is what we are taught by Lenin who is concerned with the happiness of all peoples, including yours.

``But how can he help us if he has never been to Tedzhen?" I asked. "Does he intend to come here?''

Shamseddin smiled. "Tedzhen, did you say? Lenin will come not only to Tedzhen but even to your village. He will enter every farmer's tent, listen to all of us and help us.''

``I wish he would do something about the water!''

``He will. You, Berdy, will see an abundance of it in Tedzhen!''

``I hope it all comes true!''

``Have faith and keep working for it. All'those who believe in Lenin have their soil turned to gold.''

Many years have elapsed since then, during which I have witnessed many events. And as I stood on the bank of the broad canal in Tedzhen, watching the gushing life-giving waters of the Amu Darya pour in, I recalled Shamseddin 251 and thought, "The good foreman and pupil of the immortal Lenin was quite right.'' The 550-kilometre-long canal to Tedzhen brought the Amu Darya's waters across arid desert. Some 150 kilometres further the canal reached Ashkhabad and was to run on to Kizyl-Atrek and Krasnovodsk. This unique project was realised by men who lived as Lenin had taught them.

The Kara Kum Canal is a majestic sight, but it is only one of the numerous outgrowths of the mighty scheme of construction and transformation envisaged in the republic. The land has been industrialised, with the oil industry developing at a most rapid rate.

Today wide asphalted motor ways link Tedzhen with Ashkhabad, Mari and Kirovsk. When I was chairman of the district revolutionary committee in the 1920s, I used to ride on horseback along these very roads. They were dust roads and infested with the plunderous basmachi, whom we fought to build a new life.

Looking at the collective farmers' well-built spacious homes amidst vineyards and trees today, I find it hard to believe that crowded black tents once stood on this very spot, with two sickly trees in the whole village. But that is just how things really were, three decades ago.

Yusup Kurbanov told me that cotton yields in their district last year exceeded the planned figure by 20 per cent, that they expected to surpass these results this year, and that Tedzhen, now a district centre, would soon become a regional centre. Warrior and farmer, he wore on his broad chest the gold star of Hero of Socialist Labour, and the Order of Lenin. Behind him, on the wall, was a portrait of Lenin, deep in thought. He is still among us, he hears us, and lives with our problems.

Lenin's immortal image is for ever in the hearts of the Turkmen people, who had suffered so much before these happy days.

Berdy Kerbabayev

[252] ~ [253]

GUIDING STAR

[254] 299-5.jpg [255]

Lenin and Yakov Sverdlov after the unveiling in the Kremlin Wall of the plaque to commemorate the fallen for peace and fraternity among peoples, Red Square, November 1918

[256] __ALPHA_LVL1__ GUIDING STAR

I am ninety years old and saw history in the making: I saw the awakening, the struggle and the victory of the working class of Russia, the builders of a new world.

The following scene took place in St. Petersburg in 1902. A workers' demonstration was moving along the festive Nevsky Prospekt. Over the close ranks of strong somewhat uncouth men fluttered a red banner, a bright magnet on a dull bleak day. I stepped off the sidewalk and joined the passing column, marching to the strains of a revolutionary song. More and more people joined the column as the marchers quickened their step. Suddenly there was a piercing cry, "The police!" There came the clatter of hooves and the cracking of whips. A calm but firm voice called out from the front ranks, "Let us disperse, comrades.'' The demonstration was broken up. I found myself in a lane, but I clearly realised then that a revolution was imminent and inevitable for I had just seen a force against which the tsar would be unable to stand his ground much longer.

When still a young man, I visualised the Russian people as a Samson breaking his bonds. With great inspiration, I worked on this image for my graduation work at the Academy of Fine Arts in St. Petersburg.

__PRINTERS_P_257_COMMENT__ 17---2330 257

In those days, revolutionary-minded youth used to meet at the home of Kolpinsky, the publisher. Maxim Gorky also frequented the Kolpinsky's, and it was there that I first heard his drawling bass with the characteristic ``o'' stress. It was he who had first exclaimed, "Let the storm break out in all its fury!'', an idea that was then virtually in the air.

Revolutionary events in Russia developed in a logical and inevitable sequence.

The tsar was overthrown in 1917. That same year I first heard of Lenin and came to understand that everything taking place in the country was connected with his name.

Lenin's words opened up magnificent prospects before Russia. He wrote: "This proletarian revolution will completely abolish the division of society into classes and, consequently, all social and political inequality.'' Lenin's words hit home with the force of a sledge-hammer, stirring a revolutionary people to rise up in struggle for the defence of their young Soviet state. Ill-fed and ill-clad, the revolutionary soldiers routed the well-armed and well-fed Entente forces on fronts in the North, the South, the West and in the Far East. Lenin said at the time:

``Victory will be on the side of the exploited, who are assured of this by life itself, by their mass numbers, by all the inexhaustible reserves of selfless, ideologically steeled, honest people, who strive for advancement and the building of a new life, as well as by the gigantic potentialities of energy and talent of the ordinary people.''

Lenin knew no peer in rousing the energy of the people "awakening to the building of a new life''. All the great revolutionary undertakings---the communist labour stints, the farming co-operative plan, Russia's electrification, and the constant concern to enhance the development of science, education and culture for the broadest masses--- were all connected with his name.

258

I have had the good fortune to meet Lenin several times and I feel that all who have had the benefit of this experience must pass the baton of Lenin's thoughts and deeds to coming generations.

299-6.jpg S. Konenkov

A decree signed by Lenin, and published on April 14, 1918, ordered the removal of monuments to tsars and their servants and projection of monuments to the Socialist Revolution. This was an expression of Lenin's plan for monumental propaganda in sculpture, obelisks, decorative inscriptions and basreliefs on buildings, propagating the ideas of the revolution.

Much was done to realise this plan in the very first year of the Soviet power.

In the summer of 1918 I was summoned to the Kremlin to report on the new monuments to the Council of People's Commissars. I was then chairman of the Moscow Sculptors' Union and worked at the Fine Arts Department of the People's Commissariat for Education.

When I arrived at the Kremlin, the sitting had already started. In a few minutes I was called into the conference hall where I saw Lenin for the first time. I was so excited that I could hardly contain myself.

I was invited to sit at a long table, and Lenin immediately gave me the floor. As I rose and began to speak, Lenin __PRINTERS_P_260_COMMENT__ 17* 259 leaned slightly forward and I instantly felt that he was listening with great attention. This helped me take my mind off everything but the business at hand.

I did not speak long and in conclusion read out a list of revolutionary and public figures to whom monuments were to be erected.

Lenin invited others to debate my report. Historian Mikhail Pokrovsky was the first to speak after me. Most of the others suggested additions to my list, including Spartacus, Robespierre, Jaures and Garibaldi. Most of these additions were approved.

Lenin then asked me what had to be done to get things moving right away.

Since the scheme was urgent, as Lenin had said, I suggested that the pedestals and statues should be erected before the winter set in. Sculptors were to submit lifesize plaster casts. I stressed the particular importance of the first projects, which, once approved, would serve as models.

Lenin then asked about the approximate cost of each monument.

``About 8,000 rubles,'' I said.

He emphasised that this amount should be allotted to every sculptor regardless of who he was, and then asked if it was all right with us if we got the money within three days.

I said, "Quite.''

``Then I motion that the 'three days' be entered in the minutes,'' said Lenin. "That settles the question,'' he added in a particularly cheerful manner, with an approving smile.

I bowed and went out. From the Kremlin I went directly to my department at the People's Commissariat for Education, where many sculptors were waiting for me.

It is hard to describe the strong impression Lenin left on me. I liked him very much and was amazed at his 260 vitality, his strict and efficient manner in guiding the proceedings at the sitting.

The artist in me was very much impressed too, particularly by Lenin's Socratic forehead, fringed with slightly wavy golden hair. With great delight I described Lenin to my sculptor colleagues.

__*_*_*__

My second meeting with Lenin was in connection with the unveiling of the memorial plaque in honour of the fighters who had lost their lives in the October Revolution. This meeting took place near the Kremlin wall in Red Square on November 7, 1918.

That day, the nation was celebrating the first anniversary of the October Revolution.

Lenin had proposed to the Moscow Soviet to mark this historic date by setting up a memorial plaque on the wall of the Kremlin's Senate Tower in memory of those who had died in the revolution. The Moscow Soviet announced an open competition for sculptural projects---the first of its kind under the Soviet power---and my project was accepted. I had to complete it within a very short period--- in just a few months---and so had to work night and day in my studio in the Presnya district. The plaque, 16.5 by 17.5 feet in size, was to harmonise with the Kremlin wall and the architecture in Red Square.

Lenin, who had just then recovered from his grave wound, had on several occasions made inquiries about our progress. He instructed Nikolai Vinogradov to follow the work on the plaque and on the other monuments and submit progress reports to the Council of People's Commissars. At the time, it was very hard to get the necessary materials---white cement, plaster and paints ---but Vinogradov's energetic efforts helped a great deal.

261

The plaque consisted of 49 parts. Each was to be held in place by a bolt fixed to a clamp embedded in the Kremlin wall. I virtually lived by the Kremlin wall during the last few days of the work. At last, all the preparations were completed and the plaque was covered with a red cloth to be unveiled by Lenin.

On the morning of November 7 factory delegations and Red Army units filled Red Square.

I saw Lenin, surrounded by other comrades, walking towards the Senate Tower. He greeted me as an old friend.

The short inauguration ceremony started. To cut the cord of the veil Lenin had to mount a short ladder attached to the wall.

On the plaque was the image of winged Victory, with a palm leaf in her left hand and a dark-red banner in her right. At her feet lay broken swords and rifles stuck into the ground. In the background was a rising sun on whose golden rays were inscribed the words: "The October--- 1917---Revolution".

Also on the plaque were the words: "To those who gave their lives in the struggle for peace and the brotherhood of nations''. This was the motto of my work, and I was happy that it had been approved by Lenin.

When the choir and the orchestra had finished, Lenin mounted the platform and made a speech in memory of the fallen heroes. He said:

``Comrades, let us honour the memory of the October fighters by pledging here, in front of their memorial, that we shall follow in their footsteps and emulate their courage and heroism.'' All those who had gathered by the wall listened to Lenin's speech with great attention.

Many glorious and difficult years have passed since then, but the Soviet Union continues to be in the van of the universal movement for peace and the brotherhood of nations.

262 __*_*_*__

I met Lenin for the third time on May 1, 1919, and once again in Red Square. The occasion was the unveiling of a monument to Stepan Razin, who led a 17th-century peasant uprising. The monument, consisting of several figures, was made of wood, for it was intended for a museum and was placed on temporary display in Red Square.

It was quite an event at the time.

It was a wonderful spring day, and Red Square was a sea of heads and banners.

I shall never forget Lenin on that day. He was not wearing a coat, and in his usual dark suit walking briskly right across the square from the side of the History Museum through the jubilant crowd, which parted in a wide corridor to let him pass. I remember him putting his hand on the wooden barrier as he was greeted with an ovation and then throwing it forward in a sweeping gesture to speak about Stepan Razin. His speech was short but inspiring.

Many years later, when I was working on a statue of him, I found that I could see him very well in my mind's eye making that speech. That is why I had Lenin making a speech in that statue which is now at the U.S.S.R. Academy of Science.

__*_*_*__

On May 1, 1920, I saw Lenin for the last time, and once again in connection with his monumental propaganda idea.

That day a foundation stone of the Emancipation of Labour monument was laid in Moscow, on the site of a monument to Tsar Alexander III which had been removed.

263

The Moskva embankment was crowded with people. In his speech Lenin set before workers in art the task of glorifying the free labour, and this idea became central in my life.

After the meeting, Anatoly Lunacharsky, People's Commissar for Education, invited Lenin to go by car to the Fine Arts Museum (now the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts) where the projects of the Emancipated Labour monument were on display.

Lenin suggested that we all walk there because it was not far, and I had the good luck of walking next to him. On the way we discussed that morning's volunteer labour stint.

At the museum, Lenin inspected all the projects but did not like any of them. Most were ostentatiously futuristic and looked like odd assortments of geometrical figures. Lenin stopped and laughed heartily by some, and then dismissed them with a wave of his hand, saying:

``Let Lunacharsky make out what's what!''

__*_*_*__

I am happy that I had an opportunity to participate in carrying out Lenin's plan for monumental propaganda.

Lenin devoted great attention to art, to sculpture in particular. He showed a personal interest in the erection of monuments and plaques and was indignant with those who hampered this important work.

I went to the United States, in December 1923, as a member of a delegation travelling with an exhibition of "Soviet Russian Art''. In Riga, where we were delayed by formalities, we heard of Lenin's death. I was stunned by the terrible news and began to work on Lenin's portrait from memory.

264

At the time, and since, I often thought of the great meaning in the birth of a man like Lenin.

Humanity had always awaited the coming of such a lover of men, a sage, leader and thinker. His coming was foreshadowed by the entire development of society and social relations, the revolutionary upheavals and the succession of social formations, the revelations of genius and the spiritual antagonism of good and evil. Lenin was the first man in history to implement communist ideals underlying the prototype of social relations based on true justice. There can never be a realm of truth and beauty without justice, the main condition. It is a craving for justice that makes the new man's mark of distinction.

Lenin was always fair as a man of principle. Everything he did was wise and considered, and he was remarkably modest and unaffected. Together with his people he shared the hardships during the Entente blockade and was exceptionally frugal in his personal needs, as will be seen, for instance, from his choice of a flat at the Kremlin, or from his notes to the Rumyantsev Library, promising to return the books he borrowed by the following morning. One day he asked Bonch-Bruevich, his secretary, to buy him a cheap coat. He objected firmly and quite hotly to the idea of a monument to himself. He loved nature. Out hunting one day, he was so taken with a red fox that he quite forgot to shoot, and later, glad that he did not, said to a fellow hunter, "Missed my chance! Too slow, off the mark!''

Everything about Lenin, his world outlook and all his indefatigable efforts over a lifetime to secure the triumph of justice, are a model for ages to come.

__*_*_*__

The artist in me bears a deep imprint of Lenin, which will last till the end of my days. All my thoughts and 265 aspirations have long been connected with him, with what I heard him say, and what I read in his works. As is often the case, I did not at once understand how important it was for an artist to determine to what extent his work served his people, so that everyone found that in some way they echoed his own thoughts and feelings. Today it is something of a generally accepted maxim that artistic endeavour should inspire labour, embellish man's workaday world and ennoble him spiritually. At that time, however, many thought art had a different task.

Lenin regarded art as a potent force in the building of a new life. He was usually very circumspect in giving advice on art, but in a talk with Lunacharsky this is how he outlined the programme for monumental propaganda:

``You remember that Campanella in his Civitas Solis wrote that the frescoes drawn on the walls of his imaginary socialist state served as graphic illustrations tending to educate the young people in natural science, history, and in arousing their sense of civic duty---in a word, helped to mould and educate the new generations. I think this idea is not naive at all and with a certain modification could well be adopted and realised by us.''

Today, we all realise the need for propagating great ideas through murals, monuments and frescoes.

Lenin inaugurated the first monuments and showed a personal concern in providing for the needs of sculptors and workers in art in general. He realised that practical work in implementing the monumental propaganda plan was the start of a cultural revolution. A monument standing in a square aroused public interest in the person honoured, it became a part of the city's life, and entered into men's souls.

Many generations of artists will continue to work towards the implementation of Lenin's brilliant plan for monumental propaganda, and each artist who will dedicate himself to this difficult but noble task of perpetuating the 266 ideas and accomplishments of our epoch will be spurred on and inspired by the realisation that at the cradle of socialist culture stood Lenin, a man whose life had been a bright flame, which gave light and warmth to humanity for many centuries to come.

Sergei Konenkov

[267]

A GREAT THEME

[268] 299-7.jpg [269]

Lenin at the unveiling of the temporary monument to Marx and Engels, November 1918

[270] __ALPHA_LVL1__ A GREAT THEME

The city of Yelets, where I grew up, lies less than 400 kilometres from Moscow. Yet to us, Yelets boys, in the 1920s the capital seemed very very far away, and we envied everyone who came from Moscow: he was lucky for he had been to the capital, where Lenin, the leader of the revolution, lived!

As the Soviet power was consolidated, Lenin's name became a household word in every home, so the day he died---January 21, 1924---was the coldest and bleakest for the entire country.

I was fifteen at the time, and copied portraits of Lenin for the school wall-papers. That was when I first saw his face. I worked most assiduously, with a sense of affection, and did not understand why I felt so excited.

Later, in 1932, after graduating from the art school and completing my army service, I went to Moscow, where I at once realised how little I knew. I found the city fascinating and decided to stay. I tried my hand at many things: I wrote advertisements, did retouch jobs, drawings and copies, designed book-covers and illustrated children's booklets. I also worked on political placards, which naturally often had Lenin's image on them. But I must say that 271 at the time my work was not entirely creative for I used to copy Lenin's image from photographs or reproductions.

I went to art studios and sketched from nature, but realised that I had still to work very hard to become a real artist.

Just then, in 1938, I received an offer to illustrate a book, Recollections of Karl Marx.

The work on Marx's image required a well-organised methodical approach and I should say untiring perseverance, for there were many difficulties and setbacks, and I lacked experience. It was necessary to study the epoch, to read Marx's works and his correspondence with Engels, which alone consisted of seven volumes, and to gain an understanding of Marx's individual traits. The iconographical material then available on Marx was very limited; not more than ten photographs had come down to us, and they were all related to the latter period of his life, whereas my task was to portray him as he looked in 1844, when he met Frederick Engels in Paris, etc. In a word, there were many difficulties.

But under the impact of this difficult job my character underwent a complete change. I had always been impatient and restless, but this work pinned me down to my desk and taught me to read a great 'deal; it acquainted me with the artists who had illustrated Charles Dickens's books and were contemporaries of Karl Marx.

But when I actually started to portray Karl Marx I found that not all of my difficulties were behind me: except for the hair, I had nothing to go on, and this was the source of much anguish. For example, I altered my first drawing---Marx at Lessner's---24 times.

Today I feel that work on the book gave me much more than my inexperienced contribution in sketches. It aroused my interest in themes of revolutionary history. Ever since I have found it fascinating to tackle tasks with many 272 unknowns; I was no longer afraid of difficulties, and it was quite natural, therefore, that I chose a Lenin theme as my next work. My choice had been prepared by the valuable experience I had gained in working on the images of Marx and Engels for two years. I entered into a world of great ideas, the world of the greatest thinkers.

299-8.jpg N. Zhukov

I started to work on Lenin's image at the end of 1940. At the time I felt sure that being nearer to me in time and events, in place of action and environment, this theme would prove to be less difficult. But a quarter of a century has passed since then and as time goes on I find my task ever more interesting and significant. I find it inexhaustible. I am convinced that Lenin is such a vast theme that even if I lived to be a hundred I would not see the end of it.

Marx and Engels lived in a different epoch and a different country, and since I was guided in my work only by what I could find in books, memoirs and various 19 thcentury illustrated publications, I could not, of course, compare everything I drew with actual life and so was under the impression that my first work had been a success. However, when I tried to draw Lenin, I found that my drawing resembled other drawings.

Indeed, I had never seen Lenin in life and so had to study his image from the many different photographs and documentary films, from the recollections of his colleagues, friends and relatives, from paintings, and the magnificent sculptures and drawings by Nikolai Andreyev, who had __PRINTERS_P_273_COMMENT__ 18---2330 273 had the good luck to draw Lenin in his lifetime. Finally, there were the screen portrayals of Lenin by Shchukin and Shtraukh.

These works of art exercised an influence on me, and I came to depend on them. For example, when I saw Shchukin's portrayal of Lenin in the film Lenin in October, I was so carried away by his acting that for a long time after everything I drew looked like Shchukin.

It was very hard to gain an independent vision of Lenin's image, a vision that would stem from a personal concept of the theme, and this required much time and hard work.

Looking back at my drawings of the 1940s, I feel ashamed of their imperfections, which I see clearly today, although at that time I had tried to capture the real Lenin.

For an artist there is hardly a more fascinating task than to reproduce the image of this most humane man, whose wisdom, simplicity and charm continue to dominate the hearts and minds of millions decades after his death. It is inspiring to work towards the attainment of maximum truthfulness in depicting Lenin just as he looked in his study and when addressing workers, peasants, Red Army men and intellectuals in the squares, at meetings, in the factory workshops, workers' clubs and hostels, or when meeting foreigners---friendly, cautious or hostile.

Talking to those who had known Lenin, and their vivid accounts and recollections have always been a great help. For example, when I worked on Lenin's Arrival in Kashino, a street scene in November, in which I portrayed an old bare-headed peasant shaking hands with Lenin and thanking him on behalf of the whole village, I did not want to draw Lenin hatless (for it seemed to be too cold). But when I showed this sketch to some comrades who had known Lenin they all advised me to draw him with his hat off, for, they said, they felt that Lenin would 274 have definitely removed his hat in the presence of a bare-headed old peasant. I followed their advice, and my next sketch carried more truth, warmth and feeling.

Constant consultations with comrades who had known Lenin well were a great help. I found truer forms in portraying Lenin, and seemed to get just the right expressions and gestures.

I remember showing my first drawings of Lenin to Vladimir Bonch-Bruevich in 1941. This was a lesson. After looking at them, he remarked:

``I presume that you have never seen Lenin in life.''

I asked him what made him come to such a conclusion.

``Well, look at this pose here. This arm is too stiff! It doesn't look right.''

``What do you mean?" I asked. "That's how most sculptors portray Lenin: arm outstretched.''

Bonch-Bruevich smiled and said that the sculptors must think the pose monumental, but that it actually was not quite characteristic of Lenin's gestures.

``True,'' he admitted, "Lenin sometimes threw his arm out in a speech, but only to accentuate something, and gain better contact with the audience. Lenin had a scintillating personality, but there was grace in his movements, and they were of the soft kind, more expressive and sooner directed 'at himself, which made them so distinctive.''

These remarks were of considerable value to me. They rekindled my interest in many photographs to which I had previously not paid particular attention. One of them, for example, showed Lenin sitting on a stairway making notes in his pad during a session of the Comintern Congress. Another photograph showed Lenin all attention, with head raised suddenly. Bonch-Bruevich's advice helped me to find new variants of Lenin's gestures and add the expressiveness and vividness my drawings so often lacked in the past.

Another valuable meeting I had was with the Finnish writer Hella Vuolijoki. In 1907, Lenin had stayed at the __PRINTERS_P_275_COMMENT__ 18* 275 home of a mechanic, Blomqvist, in Finland, in the small town of Aggelby, and had worked at the library Miss Vuolijoki used to frequent.

She recalled: "All of us who knew Lenin, marvelled at his ability to hear you out. When you looked on, you thought that the person with whom he was speaking was the most important person in the world, and that Lenin had found him after a life-long quest. This showed how active and attentive Lenin was in listening to people; it also showed how he valued and respected others!''

This has been stressed by many other eye-witnesses, but the way Miss Vuolijoki put it struck me as quite novel and it helped me very much in my work.

__*_*_*__

For an artist working on Lenin's image it is quite indispensable to achieve a maximum resemblance, for this gives solidity and life to all the other traits. Otherwise, talented as the artist may be, his work will lack the main element of truth.

I have often marvelled at nature's uniformities, its harmony and integrity. Lack of resemblance is always lack of uniformity, and I noticed this fact with particular clarity in my work, when the closer I was able to approach to Lenin's real image, the stronger this uniformity made itself felt. Resemblance consists of thousands of infinitesimal magnitudes making up the integral whole, and some small oversight or false brush stroke brings on disharmony.

Lenin's head and face are striking in their proportions, and whenever I succeed in finding the right combination of all the elements of his image, I always feel a deep aesthetic satisfaction.

Once I did some illustrations for Kononov's story, "The Subbotnik" (A Weekend Voluntary Labour Stint). Having 276 reread the author's account of the occasion, I stopped to think of the following episode:

``Leaving Government House, Lenin saw a row of people who had gathered for the labour stint. He asked the commandant's permission to take part and joined the line on the right flank.'' When I visualised Lenin standing in line with the rest, their spades, pick-axes and crowbars on their shoulders, against a background of the old Kremlin, I realised in a flash that I had found the right solution to the Subbotnik theme. My earlier setting for the theme seemed naturalistic and illustrative.

__*_*_*__

I spent a long time looking for a solution to a theme called "GOELRO Plan''. All earlier pictures depicted Lenin in his study, standing by the GOELRO chart and talking with Krzhizhanovsky, chairman of the electrification commission. I was determined to make a new approach but all my efforts were unsuccessful. Then I went to Lenin's study and there happened to see a candlestick, which I instantly pictured to myself as standing conspicuously on the green-baize table adjoining Lenin's desk, with Lenin pointing to it in a heated discussion with Krzhizhanovsky, as if saying: there's the proletariat's legacy from tsarism; people burning candle-ends and bits of wood in homes all over Russia; there must be millions of electric lights to supplant all that.

Once, when putting my papers in order, I came across some of my 1941 pen drawings of Lenin on the phone. I had tried to show how busy he was. In his right hand, he held the receiver, and in his left, a pencil. It was called Just a Minute, but I felt that this somehow failed to convey my meaning, and the idea behind it.

We all say, "Just a minute'', a very commonplace expression. As I groped for a more vivid and appropriate title, I read some recollections, letters and other materials 277 which spoke of Lenin's remarkable quality of putting a value on time and knowing how to fill every minute of it.

Reading about the Great October Revolution, I imagined how Lenin had valued every minute of those actionpacked days. It then dawned upon me that "Lose No Time" would be a much better title. It made the theme more dynamic and my message clearer.

The sketch immediately acquired more gravity and I realised that this in turn called for a more energetic, dynamic pose. It was indispensable that the viewer should feel the urgency of the moment: Lenin was giving a directive and saying, "Lose no time!''

Certain facts in Lenin's life help one to gain a better understanding of Lenin's inner world, his state of mind, and this is of particular importance for the artist.

Krzhizhanovsky, who had known Lenin as a youth, helped me considerably and I remember meeting him on February 11, 1958, an unusually sunny day.

I walked to his place in high spirits and with a feelingof keen anticipation. Two years earlier, after seeing my drawings of Lenin, he had expressed a rather flattering opinion of my work and promised to see me soon, but had not because of a sudden illness.

I had been very much looking forward to this day for I knew that he, Lenin's oldest friend, could give me many vivid impressions for my work on Lenin's image.

I told him of the purpose of my visit. He took my file and started to examine my drawings slowly. I closely studied his reaction.

After seeing six or seven drawings, he put them aside, looked at me and said:

``When I find painters or actors portraying Lenin in this pose, hand in vest (he showed what he meant), I do not find it convincing. This gesture is very popular among reciters and because they think it was one of Lenin's, has been much abused. Now, as regards Plotnikov, you 278 must have heard of him---there indeed was an actor who had discovered the secret of portraying Lenin. Very casually, quite unconsciously in a conversation, he would insert a finger into his vest or coat pocket, like this--- and there was Lenin to the life.''

``Of all the actors that I have seen,'' Krzhizhanovsky went on, "Plotnikov's portrayal was truest. I found the tears welling in my eyes as I watched him in the play The Man with the Gun. There was Lenin before me, I felt, it was something of a shock. His voice, too, rang so true. Many an actor, aware that Lenin had rolled his r's, often tended to overdo it, but Plotnikov knew just the right measure for everything to make it all truthful.''

``Here, take a look at this,'' he said rising from his chair and taking from a shelf a photograph of Plotnikov in the role of Lenin. Indeed, I found it to be an excellent resemblance.

``Nowadays, unfortunately,'' he continued, "many actors attempt to play the part without an adequate understanding of it.''

Out of the 60 drawings I showed Krzhizhanovsky, he made no comment on 51, but questioned the rest.

He advised me to pay particular attention to the forehead area, as he put it.

``Lenin had a remarkable forehead, but not many artists have been able to depict it, and the secret does not lie only in its height and size, but in the beauty of its proportions. Bear that in mind.''

Back in the sunlight, I walked and looked at the new buildings going up in the city, and tried to recall everything I could about the GOELRO plan. I thought about the lights of Igarka, the Volgograd and Kuibyshev hydropower stations and of the "Lenin electric bulb'', as it was called in 1920, when the village of Kashino was first electrified. I vividly pictured to myself our wonderful peasants, standing bare-headed and looking in veneration at the electric light for the first time in their lives. Their 279 faces were radiant, there was hope and faith in their eyes, as a little boy, wearing his father's jacket, joyously toyed with the switch, repeating the miracle again and again.

For all of us Lenin was that kind of light.

My talk with Krzhizhanovsky subsequently enabled me to find solutions to many new Lenin themes.

A case in point is the Story of the Budyonnovites. The theme took shape in my mind after Krzhizhanovsky had told me about Lenin's vision of electrifying the country and of switching the Russian peasant from horse to tractor.

On my drawing were two dreamers---Lenin and a village boy, a horse-toy whistle in his hand. The boy was listening with rapt attention to Lenin's story of the Civil War heroes Chapayev and Budyonny. He was wearing his father's Red Army helmet, just like those they had worn, and yearned to match their exploits. Lenin was thinking of the tractors that were transforming life in the Soviet countryside.

__*_*_*__

In the recollections of Lenin by relatives, close friends and colleagues, he stands out as a profoundly charming and humane personality. There are many moving examples of his warmth and noble spirit. You are amazed at his simplicity, clarity of mind, moral purity and integrity.

Every Soviet citizen will gradually learn to emulate the example of Lenin's life. Consciously---or subconsciously, as is more often the case---this tendency is already manifesting itself today, in various acts and habits.

I was recently at the Suvorov Military School meeting attended by cadets and artists from the Grekov Art Studio. The young men filled the hall within 10 minutes, but I noticed that all who came early had books with 280 them and read every minute. They were following Lenin's example. He valued time himself and knew how to use it with purpose under any circumstances.

People who knew Lenin always marvelled at his ability to see great meaning in little things. How infinitely interesting it is for an artist to work in search of forms reflecting this trait of Lenin's character.

The following episode is recalled by a youth who attended the Third Young Communist League Congress in 1920. When Lenin ended his speech at the congress he was asked many questions. A young peasant who had come to attend it from a remote village, asked, "Where can you get some tar to lubricate cart-wheels? The countryside needs tar badly.''

This question, asked of the leader of the revolution on such an occasion, surprised the audience; some found it absurd, quite out of place, and laughed, as if to say: think before you ask! Lenin motioned for silence, and said the question was a good one, one of paramount importance for the war-ravaged countryside. "What do you think,'' he asked his young audience, "will the wheel of the revolution, of which we speak daily and seek to provide for, go on turning if the cart, so badly needed on the peasant farms, comes to a standstill?''

That was a masterly association of ideas, and the mood of the audience was instantly transformed.

The poet Alexander Zharov, who attended the congress, told of how Lenin, sitting in the presidium and waiting for his turn to speak, sketched a neat little house and with obvious satisfaction wrote: ``School''.

In his speech on that occasion Lenin impressed upon the young people that their most urgent task was to acquire knowledge.

I recalled this episode when I recently visited a school where the children crowded around me and asked me for my autograph on the prints I had given them. All the boys and girls who queued up for my autograph wanted 281 me to address my inscriptions to their classes or Young Pioneer units. None asked for a personal souvenir. This is a truly Leninist, collective spirit. It is such a pleasure to see that the young people regard this as natural. There is an ever growing number of history circles in our schools, which teach them to learn from Lenin.

It is my personal experience that work on Lenin's image helps me to be a better man, and teaches selfcontrol in all things.

Nikolai Zhukov

[282] ~ [283]

UNFINISHED POEM

[284] 299-9.jpg [285]

Lenin in the Kremlin, autumn of 1918

[286] __ALPHA_LVL1__ UNFINISHED POEM

The town has not yet been built; nor are there any blueprints or projects. It is only a vision: a scientific centre, a branch of the Siberian Department of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Science, at Shushenskoye, in that "God-forsaken village" where Lenin was exiled.

It is still only a vision, but there is valuable experience in establishing large scientific centres in Siberia and there are men and women who can translate it into reality.

Winds blowing in from the man-made Ob Sea heralded the approach of spring. But in Siberia March and April are not spring by a long shot. Every other passer-by on the streets of Novosibirsk's Academy Centre was on skis, and one in three pulled a sled, with some chubby youngster looking at the surrounding world with precocious self-respect. The high birth rate there is second only to that of Angarsk.

Bearded or spectacled physicists, mathematicians, biologists and chemists hurriedly made their way along the sidewalks. Some were pensive.

Evening was drawing near, and the Pretty Smile Cafe and the wide-screen cinema had lit up. The day's work was over and there were many people in the streets which 287 bore fancy names that only poets or dreamers could think up. There was Seaside Avenue, named while the taiga was still there, the Street of Pearls, and the Street of Romantics.

Beyond the snow-covered little wood stood the university. Its first batch of graduates was already working in the city's 15 research institutes, which formed the nucleus of the science centre, and were its pride, labour and wealth.

An animated group of people passed by speaking English. They were scientists who had arrived for the International Symposium on the Physics of Solids. They were fellow countrymen of H. G. Wells, the man who had doubted Lenin's forecast on the electrification of Russia and the development of her industry and science. He had come to a bleak Moscow stricken with hunger and typhus. Wells would never have believed that British, American and French physicists would subsequently attend an International Symposium, one, moreover, held not in Moscow or Leningrad but somewhere "out in the sticks".

The British scientists were walking along Seaside Avenue to the Golden Valley Hotel.

I went on my way, passing the blocks of research institutes, structures built with cold calculation but not without refinement. Some of them, like the Institute of Kinetics and Combustion, were hiding out in the woods. You did not need much time to go skiing after staging an experiment.

The institutes of hydrodynamics, nuclear physics and mathematics stood close by the highway, and you could read their names from a bus.

It was getting late but there was still a light in many windows. Perhaps, I thought, some physicist or mathematician was limbering up his stiffened fingers like a tired violinist, before getting on with his formulas, swan-necked integrals and hump-backed graphs.

288

``Let's go and have dinner,'' he might be saying to a fellow scientist, which could mean the end of round one.

They stand at the bus stop for about five minutes.

The bus is almost empty, and they go on up front. There is something about them that tells you these two will go back to the institute late that night and win round two.

Inside another institute an electronic computer emanated warmth, like a living being. Its fellow worker (mathematician, historian or economist) had carefully worked out its programme, and it is now working on the calculations.

In another brightly lit window, a group of shadows can be seen round a table. This is a collective effort: the scientists are tackling a problem as a single brain, now arguing about, now fighting a silent battle.

Different struggles are being carried on in the quiet of the offices and laboratories. Some of these struggles are swift and short, others, long. More and more modern devices are helping the scientists in their work.

Maxim Gorky recalled how shortly after the revolution Lenin had told him that if our technicians were provided with ideal working conditions, Russia could become a world leader within 25 years.

Such conditions have now been created in Siberia, once a place of exile for revolutionaries.

When did it all start?

In 1957, builders arrived on the shore of the Ob Sea and pitched their tents and erected temporary barracks. Mikhail Lavrentyev, a Communist, and a mathematician of world repute, occupied a little hut near a stream called Zyryanka.

Academicians Lavrentyev, Khristianovich and Sobolev had long been planning to build a large scientific centre in Siberia, but their idea did not at first meet with wholehearted support. "Why go all the way out there?" some had asked.

They said, "Because the place is fabulously rich, and __PRINTERS_P_289_COMMENT__ 19---2330 289 we don't even know how rich. Because it is the heart of the country, and because Lenin had spoken of the colossal latent wealth and possibilities beyond the Urals.''

The U.S.S.R. Academy of Science has never had a department in its structure such as the Siberian. In contrast to all the others, which were based on some particular branch of science, the Siberian Department has various branch institutes on a single territory, which they all study, explore and develop together, training scientific personnel as they do so. Siberia is ideal for that sort of thing. Scientists must study and put to use its rich natural resources; they must study and substantiate the origin, development, uniformities and ways of using its ores, oil, gas, diamonds and gold.

The task before them is to implement Lenin's idea of fully electrifying that rich area and carrying out bold technical projects. Siberia is in urgent need of its own research personnel, trained at the highest level in the light of the latest scientific and philosophical ideas.

The territorial approach in this case is not just a matter of form. A research worker today needs to know, what you might call, several scientific idioms, for life in our day shows that some of the most brilliant discoveries have been made at the junctions of sciences. The peaks are scaled by groups of men and women specialising in several sciences. Physicists, mathematicians, chemists, biologists, economists, power specialists, mechanics and geologists live side by side and work in neighbouring institutes like friends, assistants and co-authors.

This is the demand of life and the development of science in this half of the twentieth century.

This is how scientists now work not only in the Novosibirsk science centre but also in Irkutsk, Krasnoyarsk and Vladivostok. All this confirms and substantiates Lenin's thoughts on the unity of science, technology 290 and dialectical materialism, as expressed in his Philosophical Notebooks and Materialism and Empiric-Criticism.

Still some scientists objected on the plea that it would be difficult to work on a high scientific level at so great a distance from solidly established scientific centres in Moscow, Leningrad and Kiev, and away from the libraries and the eminent scientists, who, they assumed, would simply refuse to go to Siberia (in view of their probable reluctance to abandon their laboratories, scientific schools and friends).

``But what if these eminent scientists were to take their pupils with them to Siberia?" the enthusiasts insisted.

The skeptics only shrugged their shoulders.

It is probably a rare case indeed that nearly all the laboratory personnel agreed at once, without any discussion, to move from Moscow to Siberia, thousands of kilometres away. So much so that reading about these reports in the papers and journals the reader even doubted their authenticity, thinking that things did not happen so simply. And yet that is exactly what happened in the laboratory of Academician Budker of the Institute of Atomic Energy, then headed by Igor Kurchatov. Within a couple of minutes almost everyone was willing to go. An order issued two days later established a new Institute of Nuclear Physics in Siberia on the basis of this laboratory.

The fact is that the Institute had discussed the question of the laboratory's removal from Moscow long before the proposed establishment of a scientific centre in Siberia; this was called for because the laboratory was growing into an independent scientific institution with an ever more complex range of studies.

Scientists discussed the site of the new institute. They consulted Kurchatov and finally decided on Novosibirsk.

In the meantime, Academicians Lavrentyev, Sobolev and Khristianovich, the initiators of the idea of 291 establishing a Siberian Department of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Science, were also looking for a suitable spot for a future scientific centre. By this time, many scientists of chemical and biological institutes were also thinking of transferring their laboratories to Siberia. This, in itself, was a natural process that had matured and called for a solution. That is why when the decision finally came to found the Siberian Department of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Science, the groundwork had already been well prepared.

The trees wore the golden foliage of autumn when the scientists arrived at the selected site, which soon came to be known as Golden Valley. Two years later they were quite surprised to learn that before the revolution the place had been known as Wolf Ravine.

Most of the science centre's first residents were graduates of the Moscow Institute of Technical Physics, a branch of its research counterpart in Leningrad, in whose establishment Lenin had taken an active part.

The research workers of the Institute of Hydrodynamics, Nuclear Physics and Mathematics first lived in tents, then in temporary wooden barracks and only later moved into modern flats and cottages.

The young specialists built, worked and studied, with emphasis on the latter. Lenin's behest to youth to study became the motto of the founders of the Siberian scientific centre. They organised an evening school for builders in the unfinished building of the Hydrodynamics Institute where they lectured after work (free, of course). Some of those who had attended that school were among the firststudents to graduate from the Novosibirsk University. Two years after the start of construction, Academician Ivan Bardin wrote: "Siberia was once an outlying area of tsarist Russia, one that could hardly ever boast of any educational accomplishments. I recently visited our new scientific centre being built in Novosibirsk. I arrived there at midnight and thought that I would find everyone asleep. To my surprise the institute windows were lit 292 up: the evening school was holding its classes and postgraduates were busy experimenting in the laboratories. All this was splendid testimony of our youth's craving for knowledge.''

It was a period of high adventure. Soon the tall institute buildings were completed, buses ran along the asphalted streets, and cinemas sparkled with lights.

Not all those who were coming from Moscow and Leningrad had to leave their flats to live in tents, nor was there any need to do so at the time. Still Moscow experimentators, for example, did have to shuffle between their old physics labs in the capital and the new ones being built in Novosibirsk. They envied the lucky theoreticians who were as free as the birds of the air, for they did not have to depend on any installations or instruments. Today, they, too, have settled down in the Golden Valley.

With the difficulties and the maladjustments a thing of the past, the high adventure is all that remains. But today it is in another guise, and is sooner to be identified with things like "working plan'', for it lurks behind the drawings and charts, figures and formulas, the electronic computers, plasma generators and accelerators of elementary particles.

It is less than half a century since Lenin's April meeting with the scientists of Russia, when in a friendly atmosphere research themes were mapped out and practical measures drafted for the realisation of new scientific accomplishments. It was approximately then that Lenin outlined a plan for scientific technical works, in which he gave clear expression to the idea of drawing the Academy of Science and its specialists into a most active participation in studying and exploring the country's natural resources and working towards raising the nation's productive forces and elevating science and culture.

That meeting symbolised the founding of the U.S.S.R.'s mammoth structure of science, of which the Siberian Department is one of the corner stones.

293

Physicists, who benefited by the wide horizons opened up for them by Lenin at the start of the century, were among those who did not hesitate to go to Novosibirsk and who first gave the idea of setting up a branch of their own institute in the village of Shushenskoye.

The Institute of Nuclear Physics is headed by Academician Andrei Budker, who was born on May 1, 1918, the first May Day of Soviet times, when Lenin spoke to the demonstrators in Red Square.

On September 1, 1936, he graduated from a secondary school in the Ukraine and enrolled at Moscow State University. On June 22, 1941, the first day of the war, he joined the Young Communist League, maintained his thesis the following day, and left for the front.

He gave thought to physics again only after V-Day. In 1945, he came to the Institute of Atomic Energy straight from the army, still wearing his military coat, and had the good luck of being assigned to work under Igor Kurchatov.

All questions relating to the transfer of the Institute of Nuclear Physics to Siberia and its establishment in the science centre were also decided with Kurchatov, who was the Institute's ``godfather''.

Budker considers himself an experimentator, but his pupils are prepared to swear that he is a theoretician. He, apparently, is something of both.

His old friend Alexei Naumov is the exact opposite of the energetic and impulsive Budker. Some people find him too dry, too slow, too meticulous; they fail to understand how Budker and Naumov have managed to work as a team for years. When Budker says "we think'', "we plan" or "we have decided'', everyone knows he means Naumov and himself. The ideas of Budker are carried through and ``perfected'' by Naumov. It is not surprising that the two arrived in the science centre together.

At the institute, Roald Sagdeyev is fondly called "the oldest of the young''. He is just over 30, but is a 294 professor, a Corresponding Member of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Science, and dean of the Physics Department of Novosibirsk University. He has delved deep into the physics of complex plasma phenomena. He has produced many firstclass works, some of which have been published in scientific journals abroad and in the material of international conferences.

Alik Galeyev, Secretary of the Institute's Young Communist League organisation, is 23. He is Sagdeyev's favourite pupil, and was among the University's first batch of graduates last year. During his three years of practical training at the University he has left a fine impression. Despite his youth he has already produced several independent papers. One piece of work done together with Sagdeyev was read at an International Symposium in London.

Boris Chirikov's fellow scientists say that he is the "most principled" of them all. For example, the director may disapprove of some work being done in his sector but Chirikov believes that you must finish what you start. He feels that the experimentator should be given a chance to discover his own contradictions and errors, and arrive at the right conclusions on his own. The director gives in; he may feel that he is 100 per cent right,, but he knows that he cannot make a man lose interest in some particular problem by issuing an order, and that he should not prop up his authority as a scientist by means of orders.

Chirikov is an experimentator, but he defended a theoretical thesis. Everyone devotes himself to what he likes and what he feels to be most vital for the Institute and himself, and this explains why so many important tasks have been completed within such a short time.

Boris Chirikov and Spartak Belyaev were among the first contingent of graduates from the Moscow Institute of Technical Physics. Budker remembered Belyaev as a young graduate taking his first steps in science. But when he met him again a few years later, he was astonished at 295 Belyaev's bold and deep theoretical reasoning, for by then Belyaev had fully matured as a scientist: he had won his doctorate and was an outstanding theoretician. In that capacity he arrived at Novosibirsk, and was recently elected Corresponding Member of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Science. For about a year he worked abroad in the laboratory of Niels Bohr. The great physicist became quite attached to the talented Russian. Years later, Belyaev and his colleagues welcomed at Novosibirsk airport Aage Bohr, director of the Institute founded by his distinguished father.

It was not only the presence there of his many old friends that attracted Belyaev to the science centre in Novosibirsk, it was also the quiet, and the possibility of working 16 hours a day.

Alexander Skrinsky, the youngest of the laboratory heads, who is now 29 and a Doctor of Science, virtually grew up at the science centre. He came to the Institute as a student of Moscow University for his training and gradually worked his way up to a leading position in the section. No one was surprised when the 25-year-old Skrinsky was appointed head of the laboratory. The director's order to that effect merely gave official confirmation to something that had actually taken place long ago.

That is the style of work at the Institute and the whole science centre. The idea is: trust your man. They have even coined something of an aphorism, which says: "If a man is not at the instrument panel, it doesn't mean he's idling; after all, he may be thinking.'' This approach is part of the style, which, in a nutshell, is: Honesty to Oneself and Others; Hard Work; Creative Approach; Ceaseless Search.

Is not this the essence of Lenin's style at work?

Very different people have come together at the science centre. Some of them not only work with figures and formulas, like Sagdeyev, but also paint in water-colour and show a subtle understanding of nature; others, like 296 Chirikov, love to take a dip in a hole, in the ice of the Ob Sea even when the mercury is down at 40°C; many go in for literature or sports. But all of them have one thing in common: an urge for creative endeavour, an insatiable desire to do more than they have done, that precious quality of youth that some succeed in retaining through life. Their arrival in Siberia had helped many to mature into full-fledged scientists.

Most of them were born after January 21, 1924, but it pains them to think of that cold, bleak day.

Lenin's ideas and works live on in them, for from earliest childhood Lenin and his teachings had been a part of their thinking and being: he was in the very first words they heard, the very first books they read, and his cherished image had accompanied them through school and college. Lenin's ideas cannot be separated from the fabric of their life and work.

At the dawn of the century, Lenin brilliantly affirmed and proved that knowledge is infinite and that man's capacity to learn is boundless, that his reason can penetrate into the unknown and discover new properties in matter and the structure of the world. He wrote: " Yesterday the profundity of this knowledge did not go beyond the atom, and today does not go beyond the electron... . The electron is as inexhaustible as the atom, nature is infinite.'' It seems almost incredible that these lines were written at the very start of the century.

One of the tasks of modern physics is to penetrate as deeply as possible into matter's "holy of holies''. Scientists have built gigantic accelerators to study elementary particles, but research appetites grow fast and physicists are no longer satisfied with accelerations of billions and even tens of billions of electronvolts. This means they need a new type of accelerator. This problem, now occupying the minds of the world's leading scientists, has become one of the major fields of research in Novosibirsk. They have earned praise at international symposiums and 297 conferences for their devices to help scientists in taking another step in unravelling that age-old mystery: the structure of matter. Their researches bear out and are fed and guided by Lenin's profound idea that the atom and the electron are inexhaustible. It is not mere curiosity that prompts scientists to study the structure of matter, annihilation and the solution of grandiose problems. Astronomers believe their solution will help us make flights to other worlds; engineers hope to discover vast stores of energy exceeding the potential of modern nuclear fuel many thousands of times.

Almost six decades ago Lenin wrote: "The destructibility of the atom, its inexhaustibility, the mutability of all forms of matter and of its motion, have always been the stronghold of dialectical materialism. All boundaries in nature are conditional, relative, movable, and -express the gradual approximation of our mind towards knowl- . edge of matter. . . . Human reason has discovered many amazing things in nature and will discover still more, and will thereby increase its power over nature.''

New generations of research workers are constantly joining the ranks of the scientists to carry on their work.

At one of the Institute's laboratories I saw a mopheaded lad puttering around a most intricate installation full of wires, tubes and plates.

``Who's that?" I asked.

``Volodya Balakin, he works for us---an interesting experimentator,'' I was told.

``How could an 18-year-old youth become a member of one of the country's largest physics institutes?" I wondered.

``No scientist without pupils'', was another motto of the science centre at Novosibirsk, and pupils mean not only young researchers or post-graduates but even students and school children, who may work at the laboratory in future.

In their ceaseless quest, the Novosibirsk scientists find 298 not only the solutions to the most vital problems in physics, biology or mathematics; they also find enthusiasts who help them in this quest, people who love their profession and are devoted to their work. And even if novices lack the skill and knowledge, the important thing is that they have the urge to work. They will gain the knowledge they need from the scientists, who will teach them to derive joy in creative work and teach them to respect the labours of the researcher, whether at the control panel, on a distant expedition, or at the desk. Novosibirsk University and the Mathematics and Physics School train future researchers.

These institutions try to attract capable youngsters from the distant regions of Siberia, the Far East, Yakutia, Taimyr and Kamchatka. Before the revolution, these names were symbols of backwardness, lack of culture and obscurity; today, school children from these areas attend lectures on physics and higher mathematics given by eminent academicians. And no one is surprised at this, for it is a common-place in the Soviet Union of the 1960s.

It was decided that the best way to sift the young was to stage physics and mathematics olympiads. Questionnaires and problems were sent out to all the schools. Within a few months, the winners "were summoned to their nearest district town for second-stage tests. The winners of these were then invited by the scientists to spend the summer at the science centre in Novosibirsk. Volodya Balakin was one of the 500 children who came.

Probably few universities can boast of as many academicians and professors as are to be found at the Novosibirsk Mathematics and Physics School, where worldfamous scientists lecture. But in the summer school the children not only hear lectures or solve problems, they also have fun. Many of them told me that they had never had so much fun in their lives. Every day was full of excitement! They visited scientific institutions and saw electronic computers, accelerators of elementary 299 Emacs-File-stamp: "/home/ysverdlov/leninist.biz/en/1967/LOL318/20061230/318.tx" __EMAIL__ webmaster@leninist.biz __OCR__ ABBYY 6 Professional (2006.03.0) __WHERE_PAGE_NUMBERS__ bottom __FOOTNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [*]+ __ENDNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+ particles ana other modern miracles. They met distinguished scientists of whom they had read, whose names were on the covers of their textbooks, and whom they had secretly hoped some day to imitate.

In the evenings, gathered round bonfires on the shore of the Ob Sea, children, students and professors discuss life, famous exploits and science. They talk of Lenin's behest to the young to gain as much knowledge as they can.

The third stage of the olympiad was held at the end of August. The winners who had completed their secondary education stayed on to take their entrance examinations at Novosibirsk University; those who had completed eight classes were enrolled at the Mathematics and Physics School; the rest went back to their homes to complete their secondary education. Volodya Balakin would have gone back to his Altai village to complete another year of study, but for a chance meeting with a student by the fountain.

Next to the old building of the Mathematics and Physics School is a small pool with a fountain, a favourite haunt of the summer-camp children, who gather there in the evenings to sing, read poetry, or just sit around and listen to the rustle of the leaves and the ripple of the water. Scientists also came along to discuss their various problems. It was there that Volodya met Yevgeny Kushnirenko, a student of the Institute of Nuclear Physics.

We don't know how total strangers respond to each other, but Kushnirenko, just 27, took an instant liking for Volodya.

The more he learned about the boy, the more he became convinced of his rare capabilities: the lad had the makings of a real experimentator; he was hard-working and was bent on becoming a physicist.

Kushnirenko spoke to Budker about him, with the result that Volodya was taken on the staff of the Institute.

300 He took a correspondence exam for the tenth form and was enrolled at the Evening Department of Novosibirsk University.

But let us go back to the beginning. Did the whole thing start in 1957, with the arrival of the first builders of the science centre? Or does it all date back to the time when the first hydropower station on the Ob made it possible to launch large-scale construction in the heart of Siberia?

Perhaps it all began on February 2, 1920, when, even before the GOELRO plan was mapped out, Lenin spoke of the need "to work out ... with the aid of scientists and engineers a broad and complete plan for the electrification of Russia"? Lenin said at the time:

``We must have a new technical foundation for the new economic development. This new technical foundation is electricity, and everything will have to be built on this foundation.''

Maybe it all started in Shushenskoye, in that " Godforsaken Siberian village" where Lenin and Gleb Krzhizhanovsky had often discussed various aspects of the future of the country, and of Siberia and its mighty rivers?

Novosibirsk today is not the only outpost of modern science in Siberia. Other scientific centres are now being built at Krasnoyarsk, Irkutsk and by Lake Baikal---all landmarks on that long Siberian route which rang with the chains of revolutionaries trudging their way into exile.

Scientists decided to build another such centre at the village of Shushenskoye, in the Sayan steppe, where Lenin was exiled, as a living memorial to him.

The world's largest hydropower project has already been started in that area near the Dzhoisk Rapids. Academician Lavrentyev recently went to inspect those parts.

Scientists at many institutes, including the Institute of 301 Nuclear Physics (the initiators) are already discussing which laboratories are likely to be moved out to the new scientific centre, which of them would be assigned the task of founding the branch institute at Shushenskoye and who of them would stay in the Golden Valley.

``Manyasha, you ask me to describe the village of Shushu-shu,'' Lenin wrote to his sister from Shushenskoye. "Hm! Hm! It's a big village with several streets, rather muddy, dusty---everything as it should be. It stands in the steppe---there are no orchards or greenery of any kind.''

Somewhat earlier, in a letter to his mother, Lenin had joked about having tried to write "a poem about Shushenskoye while still in Krasnoyarsk. 'In Shusha, in the foothills of the Sayan Mountains' ...'', went his first line, "but that's as far as I ever got".

This unfinished poem will be completed some day. It will be completed with the lights of power stations, building-site cranes, figures and formulas, researches and discoveries.

Another science centre is to rise in "Shusha, in the foothills of the Sayan Mountains".

There is no town yet, nor are there any concrete plans. There are only visions---like those which have already become reality: Lenin's idea of electrification implemented through the building of gigantic power stations on the rivers of Siberia. And there are plenty of capable men and women to translate these visions into life.

Wanda Beletskaya

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THE CENTRAL COSMODROME

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Lenin at a sitting of the 2nd Congress of the Comintern, July 1920

[306] __ALPHA_LVL1__ THE CENTRAL COSMODROME

It was a dazzling windy day.

A cold breeze was sweeping the ice from Lake Ladoga down the Neva, and its breath was cold. But the sunlight played on the brass bugles and nickel-coated drums of the young pioneer detachments.

The whole area---the propylaea before the Smolny, the Dictatorship of the Proletariat Square, the little enclosure with Lenin's statue, and the wide steps of the Smolny building---was red with flags and sparkled with eager eyes.

Thousands of bright-eyed youngsters were there for the city's Young Pioneer parade to mark the 95th anniversary of Lenin's birthday.

The drums beat louder to welcome the first men in space. Robust and cheerful, they walked into the square and stopped before the bronze statue: Lenin stood with arm thrust out, and full of fiery revolutionary ardour, inspiration and faith in victory.

Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin looked at the statue and then at the sea of young faces and his keen blue eyes grew __PRINTERS_P_307_COMMENT__ 20* 307 misty. Even the staunchest are moved when their mind goes back to their childhood. The world's first cosmonaut recalled his childhood in Smolensk, the cottages and wooden school, the roll of the pioneer drum.

As a shock-headed little boy with glittering eyes, Gagarin marched with other round-faced youngsters like himself, attended pioneer rallies and pledged to live and work like Lenin, and follow his example in everything.

This pledge was soon put to the most trying test, for even as a little boy Gagarin saw fire and destruction. Strange terrible men broke into Smolensk, burned and ravaged it, and led away his elder brother Valentin and his sister Zoya. Life was no longer the same: since childhood he was used to seeing his father, Alexei Ivanovich, a collective-farm carpenter, build, with his sinewy hands, log cabins and simple provincial furniture; and his mother, Anna Timofeyevna, the daughter of a Putilov factory worker Matveyev, attend to her daily chores in running the house and raising children. A different, a frightful life began with the bursting into their home of armed foreigners in greatcoats, who robbed them of what they had, and abducted grownups and even children.

Young Gagarin was tempered in the fury of the war; he was steeled by his work in the hotshop of the foundry and by his first nights over the broad expanses of the Volga near Saratov, where he was later to land after his spectacular cosmic flight.

Gagarin, grandson of a Putilov worker, is now a colonel and Hero of the Soviet Union. He has been acclaimed throughout the world as the Columbus of the Universe. Gagarin stood before the Smolny saluting the Young Pioneers.

His example was followed by his friend, Cosmonaut Herman Titov. He, too, had been a Young Pioneer, and with other boys and girls in red ties had roamed the taiga and had stormed sand castles on the river bank; he had 308 beaten the pioneer drum, and had dug flower-beds in the school garden. And although this distant Siberian village on the Bobrovka in the Altai region was spared fire and destruction, it mourned the death of many of its sons. A friend of Herman's, Yuri, was orphaned, and many others lost their fathers and brothers.

The war came to their village in the form of the heavy burden of work that fell on the shoulders of old men, women and boys-. Herman Titov worked in the fields with his mother, helped her about the house, stacked the hay and weeded the kitchen-garden. And when the going was very hard and there was not enough to eat his grandfather would buck him up and tell him about the Revolution of 1917 and about the workers who had moved to the Altai region from Petrograd on Lenin's advice to set up a commune and to start life on new lines. They established a commune in -a new village, which they called the May Morning, and staunchly defended it against raids by kulak bands and whiteguard units.

As a Young Pioneer Herman Titov heard these heroic tales about the communards' struggle for the new Leninist life, and felt himself growing stronger in body and spirit. Standing now before the Smolny and looking at the Young Pioneers of the city from which the workers had gone to the Altai region on Lenin's advice, to build a new life and develop the virgin lands, it dawned on him that everything in the life of the Soviet people was connected with this historic spot where the new workers' and peasants' power was born many years ago.

Titov held his excitement in rein. He saluted the Pioneers and gave them a merry wink.

Who can tell how many potential Gagarins, Titovs, Leonovs and Belyaevs there were in this gathering of Young Pioneers before the Smolny! They were the future of the nation, of the people and the Party. Looking at the Smolny, you couldn't help thinking of the past, and of those who had created the new world, above all of Lenin.

309

A man with a lively poetic strain in his temperament, Cosmonaut Alexei Leonov looked at the past, through the eyes of an artist. He pictured to himself the Smolny of those stormy October days, when crackling fires lit up the night and searchlights scanned the skies. He visualised couriers galloping right up to the Smolny's wide porch, jumping off their foaming horses, and running up the stairs to deliver their urgent messages. Machine-gunners with cartridge-belts slung crosswise over their greatcoats stood at their Maxims ready for action. Here and there were cannon with menacing muzzles.

Leonov saw a succession of pictures, each more fascinating than the last: he saw the regiments of soldiers and detachments of armed workers marching past with measured step, and sentries checking the passes of that endless stream of people entering Smolny in greatcoats, leather service caps or sheepskin hats and carrying rifles and machine-guns. In the blare of the bugle and the roll of the pioneer drum, Leonov discerned the neighing of horses, the clatter of hoofs, the shrill military commands and the clanging of arms. He was thinking of the ten days that shook the world. I was thinking of the ten minutes in which he himself had shaken the world. TV audiences all over the world looked on in awe as they saw an age-old dream come true. They could see the globe rotate as it floated in space. Cosmic television gave humanity a spaceman's view of our planet, and a visual lesson in geography. There below us was the misty spread of the oceans, the yellow-brown of African desert, the green expanses of Siberia, and the faintly glistening glaciers of the Pamir.

But the oceans and continents were merely a backdrop for the staggering spectacle of a man looking out of the Voskhod-2 capsule.

``This is Almaz. . . . This is Almaz,'' Leonov repeated his sign call. "Everything is in order. I feel fine!''

What followed was truly fantastic.

310

Floating out of the narrow hatch and holding on to the edge, Leonov looked out into space, the first man to do so.

Then came the tensest moment, the moment of the greatest suspense not only for Leonov himself but also for all the scientists, doctors, designers and instructors--- for all who had taken part in preparing him for this walk in space.

Some scientists feared that out in space man would face a "psychological barrier'', that he would be gripped by overpowering terror, and that his instinct of selfpreservation would predominate.

Can man overcome his "fear of heights"? Will he be able to fully control himself and stifle the old and powerful instincts? Would these primitive reflexes, largely suppressed by upbringing and education, by will-power and reason, gain the upper hand once man came into contact with another world?

Leonov found himself at a tremendous altitude above the earth with a boundless vacuum all around him. How terrible it must be to lose one's foothold on the spaceship, which then seemed like the last bit of the earth. Man was bound to experience a turbulent emotional reaction, perhaps a muscular cramp, and the illusion of falling. What would happen to man in his first seconds of free flight in space? Would he suffer from nervous shock or hallucinations? Would he be paralized or hit by a paroxysm of fear?

Leonov had no fear of the unknown. He steadily left the hatch, holding on to the side with his hermetically gloved hand.

Together with the spaceship he was flying at a speed of 28,000 kilometres an hour. Below him he saw the indigo blue of the Black Sea, the cup-shaped Tsemesk Bay, the port of Novorossiisk, the crystal-white sanatoriums of Sochi and the green fields of Kuban.

At last, having got the go-ahead from Pavel Belyaev, 311 Leonov released his hold, and at once floated away from the spaceship.

He swam, he glided, he flew.

He was out there for twenty minutes, including the ten-minute walk that shocked the world.

This man, Leonov, who with his spaceship commander and friend Pavel Belyaev, had accomplished this great feat, now stood before the Smolny; he looked at Lenin's statue and at the young Leninists and thought of the past which had laid the foundation for all of today's exploits. He had read much about the October Revolution and had always shown a great interest in Lenin's life and struggle.

__b_b_b__

``Here is where Lenin walked on his way to the Smolny,'' said Cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov pensively.

And, as though following in Lenin's footsteps, they entered the Smolny.

Everywhere they went in the building---in the long corridors, on the stairway landings and in the halls---they were greeted with flowers and smiles. Leonov pictured to himself the scene of several decades ago when soldiers and sailors hung with weapons marched along that same vaulted corridor then filled with a pall of tobacco smoke; there were the Petrograd workers with rifles held firmly in their strong hands, and motorcyclists in squeaky leather coats and boots.

The cosmonauts reached the second floor and came to Room No. 86. The door was open. This is where Lenin had lived and worked.

They entered and saw a low oval table and several armchairs with antimacassars, so familiar to everyone from films and paintings. Here Lenin had talked with peasant delegates who had walked across half the country to see him; held conferences, had his meals, and thought out the general tasks of the armed uprising.

Komarov took a few steps to look behind a low white 312 wooden partition. Two ordinary Army cots, a table and a few chairs was all the furniture Lenin and his wife had.

``You know, I didn't feel half so excited at the countdown,'' said Komarov.

Leonov ran his hand over the back of the cot.

``We've all so much to learn from Lenin.''

Pavel Belyaev, a person of remarkable poise, was greatly stirred as he looked around the room---the headquarters of the October Revolution, the centre of the uprising. He approached the little table and ran his eyes over the yellow pages of the newspapers; he looked at Lenin's telephone, and the common penholder he had used to sign the early decrees of the Soviet power and to write his articles.

Belyaev's attention was attracted by a book--- Krupskaya's reminiscences of Lenin's life in the Smolny. He picked it up and read the following:

``Ilyich and I moved into Smolny. We were given a room there formerly occupied by a dame de class. It was partitioned off to make room for a bed. Admission to it was through the wash-room.. .. No wonder that coming into his room behind the partition of our Smolny apartment late in the night, Ilyich could not fall asleep; he would get up again to ring someone upon the telephone and issue some urgent orders, and when he did fall asleep at last he would talk business in his sleep.

``Work at the Smolny went on day and night. In the early days, it was the centre of all activities---Party meetings and sittings of the Council of People's Commissars were held there, the various Commissariats carried on their work there, telegrams and orders were issued from there, and people flocked there from all over.''

A research worker who accompanied the cosmonauts drew their attention to the fact that late at night upon his arrival in the Smolny, Lenin wrote his appeal "To the Citizens of Russia" proclaiming the overthrow of the bourgeois Provisional Government and the transfer of all 313 power to the Revolutionary Military Committee, the organ of the Petrograd Soviet of Workers' and Peasants' Deputies. That day, Lenin's words written in the Smolny echoed round the world: "The workers' and peasants' revolution, about the necessity of which the Bolsheviks have always spoken, has been accomplished.''

The cosmonauts proceeded to the white-stone assembly hall. It was here that the Second All-Russia Congress of Soviets formed the first workers' and peasants' government, the Council of People's Commissars, headed by Lenin.

The large empty hall echoed to their footsteps. The cosmonauts and with them Lieutenant-General Kamanin made their way towards the central aisle. Here they stopped and gave the military salute.

``It was here that the Soviet power was born, and we with it,'' said Yuri Gagarin.

Behind the words "and we with it" was the Party's powerful revolutionary transformation of the entire country, and the birth of the new man.

Lenin thought and worked for the welfare of the people. The fighters who died for the cause of the Revolution had fought for man's freedom and happiness. The cosmonauts standing in the centre of the Smolny commencement hall were vivid proof of the Soviet power's accomplishments over the past decades. They proved to be worthy successors of those who had stormed the Winter Palace. The revolution goes on, its flame raging in the nozzles of boosters putting Soviet spaceships into orbits round the stars; its inflaming heat has been smelted into scientific knowledge, in daring endeavours and discoveries, and finds expression in the calm courage of the cosmonauts. Today, the road to communism and the road to the stars have met and merged.

I looked at the cosmonauts and thought of revolutionary continuity. There, I thought, was the new man for whom Lenin had so passionately yearned.

314

It is not for gain or glory but for mankind's welfare and for the development of science that Soviet cosmonauts perform their exploits.

We owe all our victories in space to Lenin's concern for the development of science. The ability to foresee the future is one of the most vital aspects of Leninism.

Academician Sergei Vavilov once wrote that as far back as 1909, a period of reaction following the defeat of the 1905 revolution, Lenin's Materialism and EmpirioCriticism pierced the mist of idealism, mysticism and God-seeking like a strong ray of light. Lenin swept away the cobweb of empirio-criticism and supplanted it with the ever green theory of dialectical materialism. The emergence on the scientific scene of the "Revolutionary Radium" and of the electron showed Lenin the beginning of a revolution in natural science, for each of these discoveries provided science with the possibility of penetrating into one of the atom's two spheres: the electron gave access to the atom's shell, and radium and radioactivity, to the atomic nucleus.

All the attempts of the old-school physicists to build a model of the atom on the strength of the ``classical'' concept of a ball or point electron endowed with some definite physical properties were fruitless and led science into a dead end. Lenin showed up the cause of the error: they took the electron as "the last'', the ``exhaustible'' particle of matter. Actually, the electron turned out to be just as inexhaustible as the atom.

From the microcosm of the atom, Lenin turned his gaze to the mysterious macrocosm of the universe. There was a telescope at Gorki, and Lenin loved to look at the stars, and to think of the Sun---the source of all life on earth--- and of the constellations and the abyss of space.

Lenin's range of scientific interests was extraordinary : it included the theory of relativity and hypotheses of the earth's structure; the Kursk Magnetic Anomaly, and electrification; radio communications, the use of 315 combustible shales and sapropels, diesel locomotives, chemically pure reagents, the industrial exploitation of Karabogaz, the irrigation of the Mugansk steppes, prospecting for oil in Ukhta, help for the Pulkovo Observatory and Academician Pavlov's life-work. It was at this time that Lenin also advanced the idea of producing a universal geographical atlas and gave a plan for it.

Nikolai Gorbunov, a veteran Bolshevik, wrote: "As early as 1918, at the height of the struggle, Lenin found time to take an interest in science and proposed to the Academy of Science to specify the problems on which it could start doing useful work at once. Simultaneously, he supported the draft proposal for organising two of the first Soviet research institutions---the now world-famous Nizhny Novgorod Radio Laboratory and the All-Russia Food Institute. In December 1918, Lenin approved the draft project for a central state technical and scientific institution and set before it the task of organising scientific-technical work in the country.''

Lenin was a man of action, swift decisions and practical implementation of adopted plans. The young Soviet republic was still fighting on the fronts of the Civil War, suffering hunger and incredible privation and hardship, but it was already building up its science for the people, for their happiness and future. In 1918, Lenin wrote his historic Draft Plan for Scientific Technical Works; he signed the decree founding the Leningrad PhysicoTechnical Institute, which under the guidance of Academician Abram Yoffe trained many outstanding atomic physicists. Lenin authorised the building of a Radium Institute, a Radium Factory and the Nizhny Novgorod Radio Laboratory, and the Central Aerohydrodynamics Institute. The latter being evidence of his interest in the exploration of space.

__b_b_b__

Yelena Drabkina, an old member of the Bolshevik Party, described the following interesting episode during the 316 Eighth Congress of Soviets. Lenin was sitting in an armchair, discussing the electrification of Russia and atomic energy: the latter theme had come up in connection with a strange article in the November 20, 1920, issue of the English journal Nation which read:

A radiogram from Moscow announced the other day that a Russian scientist had at last discovered the whole secret of atomic energy. If that news were true, the man who held that secret could command the planet. He could laugh at our toy explosives. He could smile at our labours to extract coal and harness waterfalls. He would be something more than the sun to us, the controller of all energy.

If a reputable British journal could publish such a sensational article at the time, it showed that even then there were people in Britain prepared to believe in the strength of the young Soviet science and expecting it to do wonders.

Lenin's brilliant GOELRO plan, the plan for the electrification of Russia, was discussed at the Eighth Congress of Soviets. It is significant that at the time Lenin already spoke of atomic energy.

In the intervals between the sittings of the Congress at the Bolshoi Theatre, Lenin also spoke about outer space. He was sure that the era of cosmic flight would arrive, and he looked to it and discussed it with his comrades who fought with him for the future. Yelena Drabkina has also given an account of this "space discussion" with Lenin.

He also touched upon the space topic in his interview with H.G. Wells. The main subject of that historic discussion between a bourgeois intellectual and "the dreamer in the Kremlin"---as Wells later referred to Lenin---is well known: it dealt with the possibility of building socialism in a country ravaged by war, famine, epidemics and poverty. Wells did not believe it possible to transform a ruined country; he deplored its future, and, of course, 317 doubted Lenin's every word about Russia's electrification.

The "Kremlin dreamer" surprised Wells not only with his "electrical utopia" but also with his ideas on space exploration.

Lenin believed that man had infinite power and foresaw his victory over the atom and space.

Lenin met Friedrich Tsander, a distinguished scientist and inventor, on December 30, 1921. The meeting took place in Moscow at a gubernia conference of inventors where Tsander read a report on his project for an interplanetary space airship. He was very excited when he heard that Lenin would be present. At the time very few people gave serious attention to space flight: the country was going through a hard period, and there was a shortage of everything. Even at the conference, people sat in their overcoats because of the cold. Lenin found time to go to the conference; he heard Tsander's report and met him later.

Their talk took place in a small room adjoining the conference hall. Lenin shook hands with the excited Tsander and studying his thin face invited him to sit down. He then asked him a few questions, and as Tsander answered, Lenin listened, his eyes slightly narrowed, chin on hand.

Suddenly he asked:

``Will you go up there first?''

``Of course I will,'' answered Tsander. "I must set the example for others to follow.''

As they parted, Lenin shook him firmly by the hand, wished him success, and promised to help. "I could not sleep all night, so strong was the impression of my meeting with Lenin,'' Tsander told one of his colleagues years later. "All through the night, I paced the floor in my tiny room, thinking of the man's greatness. I thought to myself: the country was war-ravaged, short of bread and coal and with its factories idle, and yet this man at the helm of such a large state managed to find the time 318 to listen to a report about interplanetary flight. . This means that my dream will come true.''

Lenin's concern for the promotion of science and his attention to problems of space flight have yielded excellent results: the Soviet Union leads the world in space exploration, and its space scientists, designers, cosmonauts, workers and engineers are blazing the path to the stars in the conquest of space.

The Soviet cosmonauts are all Leninists, implementing his behests; they remember'his words: "Human reason has discovered many amazing things in nature and will discover many more, thereby enhancing its power over nature.''

Lenin advanced the task of conquering and transforming nature, and of putting to use all its resources for the benefit of mankind. Soviet scientists and cosmonauts are engaged in solving this task on earth and in space.

There was a time when Lenin watched the flight of a solitary plane---the symbol of an air force parade over Red Square. But he was sure of the future---the Soviet Union's mighty air fleet and the spaceships of which he had spoken to H.G. Wells.

His visions are being realised: the Soviet people are exploring the universe; they are preparing man for interplanetary flights in the name of peace and the future of humanity.

In the long future ahead, as man settles on other planets in the infinite ocean of space, people from the planet Earth will always remember Lenin, who had inspired the " struggle for a new world and a new type of man.

Yevgeny Ryabchikov

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