I Wonder As I Wander by Langston Hughes
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Excerpts from I Wonder as I Wander by Langston Hughes Although it was written in 1954, it covers the period from 1931 to 1938 CONTENTS 3 MOSCOW MOVIE ................................................................................................................. 1 BANNER AT THE BORDER ................................................................................................. 1 SCENARIO IN RUSSIAN ...................................................................................................... 2 THE MAMMY OF MOSCOW.............................................................................................. 6 NEGROES IN THE USSR ..................................................................................................... 8 WHITE SANDS OF ODESSA ............................................................................................... 9 THE BITTER END ................................................................................................................ 11 4 SOUTH TO SAMARKAND .................................................................................................. 14 FORBIDDEN TERRITORY .................................................................................................. 14 ASHKHABAD ADVENTURE .............................................................................................. 18 DARKNESS BEFORE NOON .............................................................................................. 21 ONCE THE GARDEN OF EDEN ........................................................................................ 22 TURKMENIAN FLAMENCO ..............................................................................................24 KOESTLER WASHES HIS HANDS ................................................................................... 26 HIGH HOLY BOKHARA ....................................................................................................28 SYNAGOGUES AND PENCILS ........................................................................................... 30 DESERT CARAVANSERAI .................................................................................................. 32 LITTLE OLD LADY ............................................................................................................. 34 TARTAR RENDEZVOUS ................................................................................................... 40 WEDDING IN TASHKENT ................................................................................................. 45 LIGHT FOR ASIA ................................................................................................................ 47 DIXIE CHRISTMAS USSR .................................................................................................. 49 FLOWERS TO THE FAIR ................................................................................................... 52 FAREWELL TO SAMARKAND .......................................................................................... 54 5 SPRING BESIDE THE KREMLIN ......................................................................................... 58 ZERO WEATHER, ZERO HOUR........................................................................................ 58 BREAD, RED TAPE AND POETS .......................................................................................59 THEATER OF THE WHIRLING SEATS ............................................................................. 61 MOSCOW ROMANCE ....................................................................................................... 63 IRRITATED AND SALIVATED .......................................................................................... 64 ILLUSION AND DISILLUSION ..........................................................................................67 D. H. LAWRENCE BETWEEN US ..................................................................................... 68 MAKING RUSSIANS DO RIGHT ...................................................................................... 69 MAY DAY IN MOSCOW .................................................................................................... 71 NATASHA'S BIG SCENE ..................................................................................................... 73 HECTIC FINAL! ................................................................................................................... 75 TRANS-SIBERIAN EXPRESS ..............................................................................................76 TEN DAYS TO VLADIVOSTOK .........................................................................................78 8 WORLD WITHOUT END ................................................................................................... 81 BOMBS IN BARCELONA .................................................................................................... 81 SWEET WINE OF VALENCIA ............................................................................................ 83 BREAKFAST IN MADRID ................................................................................................... 85 HARLEM SWING AND SPANISH SHELLS .......................................................................87 DEATH AND LAUGHTER ................................................................................................. 89 BODY HERE, LEG THERE .................................................................................................. 91 GENERAL FRANCO'S MOORS ......................................................................................... 92 CITATION FOR BRAVERY .................................................................................................95 MY ONE AND ONLY WOUND ........................................................................................ 96 A HEMINGWAY STORY.................................................................................................... 98 HAIL AND FAREWELL ..................................................................................................... 99 HAND GRENADES AND RATIONS ................................................................................ 100 HOW A MAN DIED .......................................................................................................... 102 NEGROES IN SPAIN ......................................................................................................... 105 ARTISTS UNDER SIEGE ................................................................................................... 107 HOW TO EAT A CAT ....................................................................................................... 109 SALUD MADRID ................................................................................................................ 110 HAPPY NEW YEAR ............................................................................................................ 114 3 MOSCOW MOVIE BANNER AT THE BORDER Driving as fast as I could from coast to coast, I got to New York just in time to pick up my ticket, say goodbye to Harlem, and head for the North German Lloyd, loaded down with bags, baggage, books, a typewriter, a victrola, and a big box of Louis Armstrong, Bessie Smith, Duke Ellington and Ethel Waters records. I was the last passenger up the gangplank, missing all the friends who had come to see me off, for when I arrived visitors had been put ashore. Crossing the Atlantic on the Bremen, it was wonderful weather. My first two days aboard, I did nothing but sleep. After almost nine months of continuous travel, lecturing from Baltimore to Bakersfield, Miami to Seattle, then a breakneck trip by Ford across the whole country, I was pretty tired. The boat was full of young people, and when I did wake up, the voyage was fun. I practiced German, studied Russian, played deck games, and danced. I had not before known most of the group going to make the Moscow movie. When I became acquainted with them on board, it turned out that the majority were not actors at all, as I had supposed they would be. Of the twenty-two Negroes headed for Moscow, most were youthful intellectuals—recent college graduates curious about the Soviet Union—or youngsters anxious to see Europe, but whose feet had never set foot on any stage and whose faces had never been before a motion-picture camera. There were only two professional theater people in the group. The one really seasoned actor accompanying us was Wayland Rudd, and the other Thespian was Sylvia Garner who had played a minor role in Scarlet Sister Mary, having been one of the few Negroes in that “Negro” drama as performed by Ethel Barrymore, Estelle Winwood and other whites in blackface. These two professionals were also the only really mature people in our group, everyone else being well under thirty and some hardly out of their teens. There were no middle-aged or elderly folks, should there be such roles in the film we were to make. It turned out, however, that as yet no one had seen the scenario, or even knew the story. But that worried none of us. It was fun to be traveling. Besides, at home, jobs were hard to get and wages were low. Among these young Negroes were an art student just out of Hampton, a teacher, a girl elocutionist from Seattle, three would-be writers other than myself, a very pretty divorcee who traveled on alimony, a female swimming instructor, and various clerks and stenographers—all distinctly from the white-collar or student classes. Although