The Daily Worker Newspaper, June 21, 1924, Page 6

THE PHILISTINE DISCOURSETH 212 tretsty N one of the many books contain- ing pronouncements of prominent men regarding Lenin, I came across an article by the English novelist H. G. Wells entitled, “The Dreamer of the Kremlin.” The editor of the book makes the observation, that “even such advanced people as Wells failed to understand the import of the proletarian revolution proceeding in Russia,” It would appear as if this is not regarded as a_ sufficient reason for refraining from publishing Mr. Wells’ article in a book which is devoted to the leader of this revolu- tion. But it is not worth while worry- ing oneself about this: I at least read some of the pages of Wells not without interest, but this was not the fault of the author as will be seen from what follows. One can still vividly call to mind those days when Wells paid a visit to Moscow. This was during the cold and hunger of the winter of 1920-21. There were already premonitions of the complications which were to fol- low in the spring. Starving Moscow was wrapped in snow. Our economic policy stood before a sudden and thorough-going change. I very well remember the impression which Vlad- imir Ilyitch derived from Wells: “Ugh! What a narrow petty bour- geois! Ugh! What a Philistine!” he repeated, raising his hands over the table with that laugh and that ex- halation of the breath which was char- acteristic of him when he ever felt a sort of inner shame on account of an- other man. “Ugh! What a Phili- stine,” he repeated when he again called to mind that conversation. This conversation between Lenin and my- self took place before the opening of a sitting of the Political Bureau and was practically confined to a re- petition of the abeve-mentioned terse characterization of Wells. But this was quite sufficient. For myself, I had read little of Wells and had never met him personally. But I was able to envisage in a fairly clear manner this picture of the English drawing-room socialist, of the Fabian, of the writer of phantasies and Utopias, who had come to view the Communist experi- ments. And the exclamation of Len- in, and in particular the tone in which he made this exclamation, enabled me to fill in the remaining features with little difficulty. And now this article by Wells, which in some inex- plicable manner has found its way in- to the pages of the collection of ar- ticles on Lenin, not only revives in my mind that exclamation of Lenin’s but also filled it with a vivid content. For if im the article by Wells there is practically no trace of Lenin, one can see Wells in it as plain as plain can be. ; Let us begin with the introductory complaint of Wells: He was com- pelled, just think, to take extraordi- nary pains in order to be able to speak with Lenin, which “annoyed him (Wells) very much.” Why, pray? Had Lenin summoned Wells? Had he pledged himself to give him a recep- tion, or had he so much free time on his hands? On the contrary. In those extremely difficult days he was occu- pied every minute of his time; he could not so easily find a free hour in order to receive Wells. This should not have been difficult for a foreign- er to understand. But the whole trouble was that Mr. Wells, as a dis- tinguished foreigner—and with all his “Socialism” a most conservative Eng- lishman of the imperialist type—was filled with the conviction that he was conferring a great honor upon this barbarian country and its leader by condescending to visit it. The whole article of Wells, from the first to the last line, stinks of unwarranted, smug self-conceit. The characterization of Lenin be- gins, as was to be expected, with a discovery. Lenin, only think, “fs in no way a writer.” Who, indeed is better able to deeide this question than the professional writer Wells? “The short, sharp pamphlets which appeared in Moscow under his (Len- in’s) signature (!), full of erroneous assumptions over the psychology of the western workers, ... express very little of the real essence of Lenin’s thought.” The worthy gentleman in of course, unaware of the fact that. Lenin has written a great number of works of the highest importance on the agrarian question, on theoretical economy, on sociology and on philo- sophy. Wells is only familiar with “short sharp pamphlets” with regard to which he remarks that they merely appear “under Lenin’s signature” that is, he insinuates that they are written by other people. The true “essence of Lenin’s thought” is to be found, not in the dozens of volumes written by him, but in that conversa- tion, lasting but one hour, which the most illustrious visitor from Great Britain most graciously deigned to hold. One could at least expect from Wells an interesting sketch of Lenin’s outward appearance, and for the sake of one well-portrayed feature we would have been ready to pardon him for all his Fabian trivialities. But the article does not contain even this. “Lenin has a pleasant” brunette (!) countenance, with an everchanging expression and a lively smile... .” “He offers very little resemblance to his photographs ...” “He gesticu- lates a little when speaking...” Mr. Wells did not get beyond the banalties of the average reporter to a capitalist newspaper. For the rest, he made the further discovery that the shape of Lenin’s head reminds one of that of Lord Balfour’s, it being long and somewhat unsymmetriéal, and that as regards his figure, he is a “small man; ory that his presence ‘fs character- istic for the actual situation in Rus- sia”: Rothstein, as one id see, was controNing Lenin on behalf of the Peo- ple’s Commissariat for Foreign Af- airs, in view of the excessive candor of Lenin and of hts dreamy lack of caution. What can one say regarding this precious . observation? When Wells entered the Kremlin he brought with him in his consciousness all the rubbish heap of international bour- geois presumptions, and with his lynx- eyed sharpness—oh, of course there was no “defective vision” there—he discovered fm Lenin’s study all that he had previously sucked in from The Times or some other reservoir of the hair-oil and spats brigade. In what now consisted the real im- port of the conversation? As regards. this we receive from Mr. Wells some pretty hopeless commonplaces, which show how wretched and barren Len- in’s thoughts appear after passing through the prism of another mind, regarding the symmetry of which there is not the least occasion to doubt. Wells came with the idea that “he would have to enter into a dispute with a thoroughly convinced doctri- naire Marxist, but as a matter of fact nothing of the kind occurred.” We are not surprised at this. We of course, know already that the “es- sence of Lenin’s thoughts” was not re- vealed by his activity, extending over Uncle Sam’s Marines protecting Wall Street’s interests in Honduras. ae UNE In EE when he is sitting on the edge of his chair his feet barely touch the floor.” As regards the shape of Lord Bal- four’s head we are unable to say anything concerning this dignified piece of anatomy and are quite pre- pared to believe that it is long. But for the rest—what an impolite piece of carelessness! Lenin was a some- ‘what reddish-blond type of man. He can in no wise be described as being a brunette. He was of medium sta- ture, perhaps a trifle under the aver- age height; but that he gave the im- pression of being a small man and that when seated he could hardly touch the floor with his feet, this could only be apparent to Mr. Wells who, with the self-confidence of a civilized Gulliver had penetrated into the country of the northern Commun- ist Liliputians. Mr. Wells further re- marks that Lenin in the pauses of the conversation had the habit of lifting the edge of his cap with his finger. “Perhaps this habit arose from de- fective vision,” suggests the very dis- cerning writer. We are quite familiar with this gesture. It was to be ob- served when Lenin had before him a man with whom he was entirely un- acquainted, at whom he took a rapid glance through his fingers while they rested on the peak of his cap. Lenin’s “defective sight” consisted in his see- ing through and through the man with whom he conversed; through his puffed up self-conceit, his narrow- mindedness, his civilized haughtiness and civilized ignorance, and after he had taken this picture into his con- sciousness, he long afterwards shook his head and exclaimed “What a Phili- stine! What a thorough-bred petty bourgeois!” The conversation took place in the presence of Comrade Rothstein, and Wells, in passing, makes the discoy- thirty years, as a politician and writ- er, but in his conversation with the English citizen. “I had been told,” continues Wells, “that Lenin was very fond of teaching, but he did not do this with me.” How indeed could one teach a gentleman so overfilled with high self-estimation? That Lenin loved to teach is, in gen- eral, not true. What is true is that Lenin was able to speak in a very in- structive manner. But he only did this when he was of the opinion that the man with whom he was convers- ing was capable of learning some- thing. In such cases he spared neither time nor pains. But as regards the magnificent Gulliver, who by good fortune had been able to enter the study of the “small man,” after two or three minutes conversation, with him, Lenin was forced to arrive at the unshakeable conviction — per- chance in the spirit of the inscription over the portal of Dante’s Inferno— “Abandon all hope!” The conversation dealt with the sub- ject of large towns. As Wells re- marks, the idea first occurred to him in Russia that the outward aspect of a town is determined by the trade in the shops and in the markets. He re- tailed this discovery to Lenin in his conversation. Lenin “admitted” that under Communism the towns are be coming considerably smaller in ex- tent. Wells “pointed out” to Lenin that the renovation of the towns en- tailed a gigantic work and that many huge buildings in Petrograd only re- tained their value as historical mem- orials. Lenin also assented to this incomparable commonplace on the part of Mr. Wells. “It seemed to me,” adds the latter, “that it was agree- able to him to be able to speak with a man who understood those unavoid- able consequences of Collectivism ‘psychology of the whole people.” which had escaped the minds of many of his own followers.” Here you have an appropriate measure for judging the mentality of Mr. Wells! He re- gards as the fruit of his own won- derful acumen, the discovery that un- der Communism the present concen- trated urban agglomerations will dis- appear and that many of the present capitalist architectural monstrosities will only retain their value as his- torical memorials (if they do not me- rit the honor of being destroyed). How, of course, should the poor Com- munists (“the weary fanatics of the class struggle,” as Wells calls them) hit upon such discoveries, which for the rest, have long since been set forth in the popular commentary up- on the old program of the German So- cial Democracy. We will not elabor- ate on the fact that all th‘s was al- ready well known to the classical Utopians. Now I hope you will understand why Mr. Wells “failed to remark” that laugh of Lenin’s of which he had heard so much, It was not a laughing matter for Lenin. I even fear that his jaws were being moved by a reflex action directly opposed to laughter. But here Lenin had recourse to the service of his dexterous and skillful hand, which was always ready to con- ceal in good time the impolite yawn from a man too much charmed with his own conversation. As we have already heard Lenin did not teach Wells—for reasons which - we consider quite justified. As com- pensation therefore Wells was most emphatic in teaching Lenin. He im- parted to him the very original idea that for the success of Socialism “it is necessary, not only to build up the material side of life, but also the He pointed out to Lenin, that “the Rus- sians are by nature individuals and merchants.” He explained to him that ‘Communism was “immoderately hasty and destroyed before it was able to build, and other things to the same effect. “That led us,” relates Wells, “to the fundamental point of the dif- ferences of opinion between us, to the differences between evolutionary Col- lectivism and Marxism.” Under evolu- _ tionary Collectivism one must under- | sland the Fabian concoction of Liber- alism, Philanthrophy, economic social legislation and Sunday homilies re- garding a better future. Wells himself formulates the essence of evolution- ary Collectivism as follows: “I believe that by means of a regulated system of education of society, the existing capitalist order can become civilized and transformed into a_ collectivist one.” Wells himself does not ex- plain who will carry out and upon whom will be carried out this “regu- lated system of education”: the Lords with the long skulls upon the English proletariat, or vice versa, the prole- tariat upon the skulls of the Lords? Oh no, anything you like, but not the latter! For what purpose do there exist in the world these enlightened Fabians, the men of thought, of altru- istic conduct, ladies and gentlemen, like Mrs. Snowden and Mr. Wells, if not—by means of a regulated and pro- longed exuding of that which is hiding itself under their own skulls—to civi- lize capitalist society and to trans- form it into a collectivist one with such reasonable and happy “gradual- ism,” that even the Royal Dynasty of Great Britain will not perceive it? All this was set forth by Wells to Lenin and to all this Lenin listened. “For myself,” Wells graciously re- marks, “it was downright refreshing (!) to speak with this exceptional, small man.” But for Lenin? Oh, long- suffering Hyitch! He was probably pronouncing under his breath some very expressive and spicy Russian words. He di not translate them out loud into English, not only probably because his English vocabulary did not extend so far, but also out of con- siderations of politeness. Ilyitch was very polite. “He was compelled,” says Wells, “to reply to me by declaring that modern capitalism is incurably greedy and wasteful and that it is in- capable of learning anything.” Lenin referred to a number of facts which, among others, are contained in @ re- cent book by Chiozza Money: Capi- (Continued on page 7)