Winter, I949 7 SOVIET v. AMERICAN INTELLECTUALS: Fadayev, Pavlenko, Shostakovich v. Homage to Twelve Judges Counts, Lowell, McCarthy, Macdonald Special Supplement on An Editorial the Waldorf Conference “HTTHE Fellows arc aware that objections may be made to awarding a -*■ prize to a man situated as is Mr. Pound. In their view, however, the In This Issue: possibility of such objection did not alter the responsibility assumed by the jury of selection. To permit other considerations than that of poetic E.R.P.— A CRITIQUE OF PRODUCTION achievement to sway the decision would destroy the significance of the E C O N O M ICS, by Martin French ........ 3 award and would in principle deny the validity of that objective perception A CONJECTURE IN AMERICAN HIS- of value on which any civilized society must rest.” TORY, 1783-1815, by Paul Goodman __ II This seems to me the best political statement made in this country for Comment by Richard Hofstadter and some time, just as the action of the Fellow's in awarding the 1948 Bollingen Oscar Handlin Prize to Ezra Pound’s The Piscm Cantos (New’ Directions, $2.75) is the THE LIFE & THO UGHT OF SIM O N E brightest political act in a dark period. Let me explain why, despite the WEIL, by Simone Petrement ............. 13 disclaimers of the Fellow’s themselves, I consider their award a political, as well as a literary, event. TRANSATLANTIC ............................. *19 Reportage from France, Germany, and As is well known, Mr. Pound’s situation is disreputable and hopeless Spain to a dramatic degree. For many years, he has articulated fascistic and anti- semitic sentiments; during the war, he made radio propaganda from Italy A FIRST STEP TOW ARD DISARM AM ENT for Mussolini’s regime and against his native country; he is now' under arrest by C. Daniel & A. M. Squires .... ...... 28 Comment by A. P. Lerner, A. J. Muste, in a Washington mental hospital and will be tried for treason w'hen and if and Sidney Hook he is pronounced mentally competent. The very book for which he is now honored Was mostly written in a U.S. Army prison in Pisa, nor is it by any THE EXISTENCE OF JEWS AND EXISTEN­ means free of its author’s detestable social and racial prejudices. TIALISM, by Lionel Abel ... 37 What Is a Jew? by Simone Weil The prize committee is a distinguished one. Its members are: Conrad Aiken, W . H. Auden, Louise Bogan, T . S. Eliot, Paul Green, Robert Lowell, N.M.U. and U.A.W., TW O KINDS OF Katherine Anne Porter, Karl Shapiro, the late Theodore Spencer, Allen U N IO N DEMOCRACY, by Daniel Rosen­ Tate. Willard Thorp, and Robert Penn Warren. These constitute the Fel­ blatt ..... 41 low's in American Literature, a board appointed by Luther Evans, the Libra­ THEATRE CHRONICLE: SARTRE AND rian of Congress. Thus we have a committee composed of eminent American THE McCOY, by Mary McCarthy ....... 49 writers and appointed by a high Government official, giving an important literary prize to a man under arrest for treason. I think there are not many IS VYSHINSKY A TRAITOR? A ••Politics" other countries today, and certainly none East of the Elbe, where this could Exclusive ........................................ 51 happen, and I think w’e can take some pride as Americans in having as yet THE CASE FOR PACIFISM, by Alvin preserved a society free and “ open” enough for it to happen. Schwarz ........ 52 Whether The Pisan Cantos is the best poetry published by an American BOOKS ..... .................................... 53 last year or not, I am incompetent to judge. Nor is this the point considered Reviews by Ethel Goldwater and Robert here, which is rather that by some miracle the Bollingen judges w'ere able Bek-Gran to consider Mr. Pound the poet apart from Mr. Pound the fascist, Mr. Pound the antisemite, Mr. Pound the traitor, Mr. Pound the funny-money LETTERS .................- .................. *.... 55 crank, and all the other Mr. Pounds whose existence has properly nothing HrjRE & N O W .................................. 57 to do with the question of whether Mr. Pound the poet had or had not The Hutterites in Paraguay, by Eileen Taylor written the best American poetry of 1948. ' he Uncommon People, by Dwight Macdonald \ “ That objective perception of value on which any civil­ ized society must rest” — this seems to me a formulation To Our Readers difficult to improve. Is not one of the most repellent aspects HE next (Spring) issue will appear in June. Whether of the present Soviet system— or, for that matter, of the fas­ there will ever be another issue depends on our readers. cist system which Mr. Pound was so foolish as to admire— T precisely that any “objective perception of value” is im­ W e have run out of money. possible under it? For such a perception is possible only In its five years of publication, P O LITICS has had an under two closely related conditions. The first is that no average annual deficit of $3,300. Up to now, we have one sphere of human activity is exalted over the rest. The made this up out of our own pockets. A t the end of last second is that clear distinctions be maintained between the various spheres, so that the value of an artist’s work year, however, we faced the unpleasant fact that our 1949 or a scientist’s researches is not confused with the value income will be hardly enough to keep the family, let alone of their politics. the magazine, in the modest style to which both are ac­ The horror of Soviet communism, of course, is that it customed. Therefore, if PO LITICS is to continue, its friends reduces the individual to one aspect, the political. The and readers must put up the money. consequence is the obliteration of the boundary lines be­ W e want to continue POLITICS. Our plan is, if the money tween the various aspects of culture— or better, the im­ can be raised, to resume publication late next fall as a perialist conquest of all the rest by politics— so that the fifteen members of the Politburo decide, ex cathedra, lit­ monthly. A prospectus outlining a new "editorial formula", erally all questions, including the most abstruse problems which we hope will both improve the quality of the maga­ of esthetics and science. (See page 10 for the Communist zine and attract a wider readership, is now being worked rationale on this.) Is not the literal meaning of “ totalitar­ out. Before the next issue, every subscriber will receive a ianism” just this pretension of the political power to con­ trol the totality of human life? draft of this new editorial plan, with a cordial invitation to make suggestions or criticisms. The final version will be Such imperfect democracy as we of the West still possess depends on our continuing ability to make the kind of printed in the Spring issue. discrimination the Bollingen committee made, to evaluate W e estimate that a Publication Fund of from $10,000 each sphere of human activity separate from the rest in­ to $15,000 (an average of $2 to $3 from each of our read­ stead of enslaving them all to one great reductive tyrant, ers) will provide a solid base for a new, monthly POLITICS. whether it be The Church, The Proletariat, People’s De­ Contributions are now solicited to this Fund. They will be mocracy, The Master Race, or American Patriotism. Such limping justice as our courts produce likewise rests on their kept in a separate account, and will be returned to the ability to distinguish the defendant’s total behavior and donors if enough money is not raised to resume publication personality from the specific action he is accused of having next fall. Also, v/e should like to hear from readers who committed. And such cultural achievement as we are still either have suggestions to offer as to what they would like capable of is nourished by “ that objective perception of POLITICS, value on which any civilized society must rest.” to see in the new or who think they can help us raise the sum required . The wave of the future is rolling in the other direction, as the warmaking centralized State becomes more powerful. NANCY & DWIGHT MACDONALD It is ironical that it is precisely those who are misnamed “ liberals” and even “socialists” who seem to be least en­ thusiastic about the Pound award. What bothers them is the very thing that is healthiest, politically, about it: the that at least some Americans have a right to oppose Soviet fact that Pound’s treason and fascism were not taken into totalitarianism in the name of freedom.* account in honoring him as a poet. * Let us not, however, become puffed-up with righteousness. An extreme reaction was that of Albert Deutsch (whose On February 11 last, John Tsourakis, a Jehovah’s witness who for liberalism has a Stalinoid tinge) writing in the liberal reasons of conscience had refused military service, was executed at N. Y. Post of February 28. After a virulent column, in Larissa, Greece. About a month later, I am informed, a second conscientious objector was tried and executed in Larissa. The gov­ which he denounces Lowell and Eliot as “ friends of the ernment which committed these acts of barbarism is dependent turncoat poet” and criticises them because they have not for its existence on the government of this country. The State De­ turned their coats ( “ they have been faithful visitors to partment has not expressed any objection to the executions.