File:Russia in the shadows (1921) (14762882052).jpg

Identifier: russiainshadows01well (find matches)
Title: Russia in the shadows
Year: 1921 (1920s)
Authors: Wells, H. G. (Herbert George), 1866-1946
Subjects: Communism
Publisher: New York, George H. Doran company
Contributing Library: The Library of Congress
Digitizing Sponsor: The Library of Congress

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n England. ... I was loth to leave him, and he was very loth to let me go. Seeing all these distinguished men living a sort of refugee life amidst the impoverished ruins of the fallen imperialist systemhas made me realise how helplessly dependent the man of exceptional gifts is upon a securely organised civilisation. The ordinary man can turn from this to that occupation; he can be a sailor or a worker in a factory or a digger or what not. He is under a general necessity to work, but he has no internal demon which compels him to do a particular thing and nothing else, which compels him to be a particular thing or die. But a Shalyapin must be Shalyapmor nothing, Pavloff is Pavloff and Glazoun-ov is Glazounov. So long as they can go ondoing their particular thing, such men willlive and flourish. Shalyapin still acts andsings magnificently—in absolute defiance ofevery Communist principle; Pavloff still continues his marvellous researches in an old coat and with his study piled up with the 54
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GORKY IN THE GREAT DUMP OF ART AND VIRTUOSITY IN PETERSBURG DRIFT AND SALVAGE potatoes and carrots he grows in his sparetime; Glazounov will compose until the paper runs out. But many of the others are evidently stricken much harder. The mortality among the intellectually distinguished men of Russia has been terribly high. Much, no doubt, has been due to the general hardship of life, but in many cases I believe that the sheer mortification of great gifts become futile has been the determining cause. They could no more live in the Russia of 1919 than they could have lived in a Kaffir kraal. Science, art, and literature are hothouse plants demanding warmth and respect and service. It is the paradox of science that it alters the whole world and is producedby the genius of men who need protection and help more than any other class of worker. The collapse of the Russian imperial system has smashed up all the shelters in which such things could exist. The crude Marxist philosophy which divides all

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