MR WELLS IN RUSSIA

Press, Volume LVII, Issue 17320, 5 December 1921, Page 10

MR WELLS IN RUSSIA

j M. AMFITEATROFF TELLS THE | TRUTH. ! CFROJX otb OWN- conn ESTONIA. NT.) | LONDON, October 19. Some light is thrown on Mr H. G. Wells's trip to Russia last year by a declaration published in the '•'Novaya Russkaya Jijn" by the well-known writer M. Amfiteatroff, who recently escaped from Soviet Russia. While Mr Wells was in Petrograd he was entertained by artists and writers at tho Hon*3 of Arts. M. Amfiteatroff, lesenting tho deception 'lie thought was being practised on Mr Wells, broke forth into somo homo truths for which ho was afterwards arrested and tried for high treason. Mr Wells, in ''his recent book, "Russia in tho Shadows," gives the following account of tho banquet incident: "At a gathering of literary people in Petrograd M. Amfiteatroff the wellknown writer, addressed a long and bitter speech to me. He suffered from tho usual delusion that I was blind and stupid and being hoodwinked. Ho was for takina: off the respectable-looking coats of all the company present in order that' I might see for myself the rags and tattors and pitiful expedients beneath. It was a painful end, and, so far as I was concerned, an unnecessary speech." According to the Russian author the company invited to meet Mr Wells was on the whole quite peacefully inclined and in a very good humour. Naturally so, as for the first time in over two years those present vrere gathered,' as in the days of yore around a welleStved tablo and were eating a "real" dinner, with "real" meat-soup, "real" meat, entrees, and sweets. The Petrograd Commune displayed an unusual generosity in honour of the distinguished guest, and supplied the House of Arts with nine poods of meat for the preparation of this banquet, bo that for more than a week afterwards the regular clients of tho free dining-room of the House of Arts had good reason to bless Mr Wells for his decision to visit Russia! Scouting the Truth. "Mdxim Gorky, presiding over the banquet, beamed down on the gathering.' says M. Amfiteatroff, ''his heart delighted by the losy picture of decorum ana complacency .reigning in the room where for two tours speech after speech ran out and no ono had dared to pronounce ono truthful, sincere word about the' real condition* in '**hich wo were all living." One young speaker seems to have struck a discordant note. Maxim Gorky immediately lose, and in a very dry, obviously diseatisfied voioe, addressed the gathering. "Gentlemen," he said, "there are several more speakers on the list. I would ask tb&n to refrain from any | lamentations and complaints, as our ! complaints do not interest our guess, and, besides, lamentations are not only useless but also simply ludicrous." \f "WhyP" asked Mi Amfiteatrofi. Gorky did not reply, but tho answer wasi forthcoming from another, who whispered, "Because the authorities may closes the House, of Artel" 91 Amfiteatroff Lets Himself 00. "Barely jn my life had I been so indignant, upset, and excited," M. Amfitproceeds in his article. "And I felt that now; after this .dictatorial rebuke of Gorky s, this attempt to shut the mouths of his friends and fellowwriters, I, personally, could not, would not, remain silent, had no right to remain silent, and that I must'speak out not for the edification of Mr Wells alone but for that of all the Russians present. And I took out of my pocket the letter whioh I had prepared to hand Mr Wells privately ana read it aloud." It will be sufficient to quote merely the conclusion of the letter* "Our present life is miserable and abominable, not only because of the want and need we are experiencing—it is abominable because it is one continuous existence of fear and lies. R-emember, Mr Wells, that everything which; you will be shown as the alleged proofs of the positive side of our life will be either pitiful manifestations of self-deception or a tissue of deliberate lies! You see us here to-night in a well-lit,- richly furnished room, sitting at a sumptuouslv served table, partaking of a good meal, dressed more or less respectably. But if tho mad idea entered into your head to ask us to take off our coats I am afraid not a single one of us would be able to comply with your request, as under these respectable looking coats each of us is wearing dirty, unwashed rags and tatters, instead of underclothing. "To-night, when you hear in this room all these lofty words atTout your books, about art, literature, and science, believe me, they are only conventional phrases, as every head here now is preoccupied with the one and only thought—'here I am to-night having a decent meal, but have I anv chance of procuring somewhere to-morrow the fateful, indispensable thousand roubles to buy a few crusts of bread to feed my starving, weeping familv?' What a literature, art, science, Mr Wells, when during the last eighteen months 100 authors, poets, scientists hare died in Soviet Russia of starvation, want, privation and the hardships of compulsory manual labour?" A Seditious Document. "I finished amidst a dead silencer* concludes M. Amfiteatroff, "and for a few seconds I thought that I had made a terrible faux pas. But the storm of applause which broke out when the gathering awoke from its amazement at my daring showed me that I had struck the right note. One after the other those present came up to mo congratulating me, shaking mv hand. . and warning me as to my fate. Gorier alone remained teated, with an angry scowl on bis face, white as tho table doth. ." A, few days later, after Mr Wells's departure, M. Amfiteatroff was arrested. Tho speech wks surreptitiously circulated in Moscov® and Petrograd in thousands of manuscript copies, -and was proclaimed by the Soviet authorities as a "seditious document," and all who were found to have a copy in their possession were immediately imprisoned •»nd charged with high treason.