RUSSIA’S FIRST CITIZEN

Greymouth Evening Star, 20 November 1939, Page 10

RUSSIA’S FIRST CITIZEN

PEN PICTURE OF STALIN. An intimate knowledge of Russia is disclosed in the recently published book “Stalin,” by Peter Graham. This writer has closely followed events, and the following extract from his book shows that his pen can convey a clear impression of a powerful personality.

“Stalin’s summer residence, Gorki,” Mr. Graham writes, “is a nice place with white-walled rooms, pictures in gilded frames, arm-chairs and sofas upholstered in white and gold, antique marble vases, crimson curtains, palms and ferns in big pots. There are portraits of gentry of a bygone age. Not much has been disturbed since the original "owners quitted the ■scene.

“Stalin lived' there as if he had leased a furnished house for the season. He did not order-the bourgeois luxury to be removed. Neither did he profit by it very much. It did not interest him. He sat in his own cabinet with masses of papers and books and works. Here for a while he tried to learn English, but gave it up, finding it too difficult. Sometimes he would go to another room and play . which, ..it is said,...holds some fascination for him.

“In imitation of Lenin, who was a clever chess player, he played chess and gave orders that the game be encouraged everywhere. He received few visitors at Gorki. His third secretary at Party headquarters, Kaganovitch. his fellow Georgian, Ordzhonikidize and Mikoyan were almost, the only Communists invited to this retreat.

“Since so much more depended on him, he was more protected. Fifteen agents of the G.P.U. guarded the house. The road from Gorki to Moscow was constantly watched by police and detectives. Each morning punctually at nine o’clock he would set off in a glittering Rolls-Royce with two guards on the step and a police automobile following.

“He had a long working day and only got back home late at night. And after supper he commonly continued to work. He does not play cards like most of the other leaders and also, unlike other comrades, took little pleasure in sitting round a table drinking and gossiping. “In the winter he moves his family back to the Kremlin. There is a little house used by palace servants in a bygone age. There are white linen curtains to the windows on the first floor and beyond these curtains lives the dictator in four sparsely furnished rooms. One of his children used to sleep on a sofa in the dining-room. With everything at his disposal Stalin kept up no establishment. “His meals were sent up on a tray from a . communal restaurant. Seme Caucasian ■ cooks sees he has those peppery dishes which he likes, his paprika, his shashlik; washed down with wine from his native Georgia. He is not a great vodka drinker. Red wine such as one can gel at any hukhan in the Caucasus, is all he asks, lie enjoys good health; his abdominal trouble did not. recur.

“The dinner is served on nationalised plates, some of them still bearing the initials of the Tsars. He sits down to dinner in the afternoon and to supper in the evening with his new young consort, and his children. There are seldom any visitors at these meals. Stalin eats and drinks and says little. He does not discuss politics with his wife nor tell her the events of the day. When the meal is

over he moves back to his- chair, lights his pipe and seems to fall into a reverie. No one knows whether on these occasions he is thinking of affairs of State or merely enjoying the warmth of his digestive processes. HIS POSE AT HOME.

“He sits brooding with the face of a sphinx. An involuntary admirer of Stalin .describes it in this way: “■‘Calm and immobile sits Stalin, with the stone face of a prehistoric dragon, in which alone the eyes are living. His thoughts, wishes, plans crowd upon his mind ... He knows all that is happening in the spaces of immense Russia. But nothing agitates him'. He has no doubts.’

“Stalin has great power of mental concentration. He went through a test of this kind once. It was before the revolution. The Tsar’s police and military were tired of his constant escapes from banishment and decided to put him through a torture which few survive with sanity. He was- made to run the gauntlet of the Salyansky regiment and each soldier beat him as he passed with the butt end of his rifle. Stalin concentrated his thoughts upon some aspect of Marxism, gritted his teeth and walked the whole alley of yelling and buffeting soldiers. The man who could do that has some almost Indian power of thought over body. “So one need not assume that in his long silences over his pipe Stalin has not thought out the development of the revolution and the next steps in his career.

“It is noticeable that he prizes and protects his privacy. In his home he is immune form unwanted visitors or telephone calls. It is more difficult to get to see him in his Kremlin retreat than it. was to see Lenin. And he cannot be called up by troublesome citizens on the telephone. The important people of the regime have their own limited telephone exchange. Thus a call on one of the telephones in Stalin’s apartment can only proceed from one of his associates.

“According to one of the secretaries, there is an apparatus which is only used for listening into other members’ conversation. He is watchful. The power which he has won it is his intention to keep. A telephone message from him to the G.P.U. disposes of the freedom, perhaps of the life, of any individual in all Russia. The Tsars were as absolute, but their power was not so great. “When Stalin gained the supreme control for which he had worked certain more unsympathetic traits in his character manifested themselves. He became more reserved, more difficult of access, less social. He is friendly with only those who are useful to him. With others, if they pester him or make up to him. he is upon occasion very rude, letting loose foul language to which there is no reply. Yet- this roughness is broken now and again by some ray of peasant heartiness. A comrade gets ill; he sends him a barrel of honey. ‘Hey, eat this and get well!” he writes.

“While Stalin was not popular at the time of the conclusion of the first Five Year Plan he was a hero to Red youth. The attitude toward him was compounded of admiration and dread. everyone knew he was no charlatan, that he was politically uncorruptible. Ami those who had to deal with him knew that he was clever and capable. What held niniiv to

him was the belief that if he fell everything fell with him. The rest made their speeches and carried out his instructions, but he was the Mari of the Revolution.

Ai a mecling. be it of the Sovnarkom er of Communist Youth, or of

any other body, there is the characteristic Slavonic air of unreality and ineffectiveness until Stalin comes into the hall. When he made his entry, even though he might not. be going to utter a word, backs straightened, attentiveness concentrated; the audience was in the presence of the great leader, reality had entered. “When he speaks it is with strong Georgian accent. His speeches are written, and he stares at his manuscript while he reads. As an orator he would Ire ineffective but for the fascination of his personality and his sharp unexpected gestures. “His speeches are lengthy but not verbose. The wording is succinct and direct. They make better reading than the speeches of Lenin and Trotsky because they are informed more by purpose than by theory. Yet there is a curious disparity between his speeches and his conversation, the one so discursive and urbane, the other so sparse and rough.”