indulged in a shouting match because Chicherin had been a friend of my
Uncle Rollo and I had hopes of him. I shouted that I should denounce him as
a murderer. It seemed to us and to Allen vital to get him out of Russia as soon
as possible, and we felt that this order to wait for Soviet doctors would
endanger his life. At last a compromise was e?ected by which the doctors saw
him at once. One of them was called Popo?; the name of the other I have
forgotten. The Soviet Government thought that Allen was friendly to them
and that Guest and Mrs Snowden and I were anxious he should die so as to
suppress his testimony in their favour.
At Reval I met by accident Mrs Stan Harding, whom I had not known
before. She was going into Russia ?lled with enthusiasm for the Bolsheviks. I
the autobiography of bertrand russell 322did what I could to disenchant her, but without success. As soon as she
arrived they clapped her into gaol, and kept her there for eight months.
She was ?nally liberated on the insistent demand of the British Government.
The fault, however, lay not so much with the Soviet Government as with a
certain Mrs Harrison. Mrs Harrison was an American lady of good family
who was with us on the Volga. She was in obvious terror and longing to
escape from Russia, but the Bolsheviks kept her under very close observation.
There was a spy named Axionev, whom they had taken over from the ancien
régime, who watched her every movement and listened to her every word. He
had a long beard and a melancholy expression, and wrote decadent French
verse with great skill. On the night-train he shared a compartment with her;
on the boat whenever anybody spoke with her he would creep behind
silently. He had extraordinary skill in the art of creeping. I felt sorry for the
poor lady, but my sorrow was misplaced. She was an American spy,
employed also by the British. The Russians discovered that she was a spy,
and spared her life on condition that she became a spy for them. But she
sabotaged her work for them, denouncing their friends and letting their
enemies go free. Mrs Harding knew that she was a spy, and therefore had to
be put away quickly. This was the reason of her denouncing Mrs Harding to
the Soviet authorities. Nevertheless, she was a charming woman, and nursed
Allen during his illness with more skill and devotion than was shown by his
old friends. When the facts about her subsequently came to light, Allen
steadfastly refused to hear a word against her.
Lenin, with whom I had an hour’s conversation, rather disappointed me. I
do not think that I should have guessed him to be a great man, but in the
course of our conversation I was chie?y conscious of his intellectual limita-
tions, and his rather narrow Marxian orthodoxy, as well as a distinct vein of
impish cruelty. I have told of this interview, as well as of my adventures in
Russia, in my book Practice and Theory of Bolshevism.
There was at that time no communication with Russia either by letter or
telegram, owing to the blockade. But as soon as I reached Reval I began
telegraphing to Dora. To my surprise, I got no reply. At last, when I was in
Stockholm, I telegraphed to friends of hers in Paris, asking where she was,
and received the answer that when last heard of she was in Stockholm. I
supposed she had come to meet me, but after waiting twenty-four hours in the
expectation of seeing her, I met by chance a Finn who informed me that she
had gone to Russia, via the North Cape. I realised that this was a move in our
long-drawn-out quarrel on the subject of Russia, but I was desperately worried
for fear they would put her in prison, as they would not know why she
had come. There was nothing one could do about it, so I came back to England,
where I endeavoured to recover some kind of sanity, the shock of Russia
having been almost more than I could bear. After a time, I began to get letters
russia 323from Dora, brought out of Russia by friends, and to my great surprise she liked
Russia just as much as I had hated it. I wondered whether we should ever be
able to overcome this di?erence. However, among the letters which I found
waiting for me when I got back to England, was one from China inviting me
to go there for a year to lecture on behalf of the Chinese Lecture Association,
a purely Chinese body which aimed at importing one eminent foreigner
each year, and had in the previous year imported Dr Dewey. I decided that
I would accept if Dora would come with me, but not otherwise. The di?culty
was to put the matter before her, in view of the blockade. I knew a Quaker
at Reval, named Arthur Watts, who frequently had to go into Russia in
connection with Quaker relief, so I sent him a telegram costing several
pounds, explaining the circumstances and asking him to ?nd Dora if he
could, and put the matter before her. By a stroke of luck this all worked out. If
we were to go, it was necessary that she should return at once, and the
Bolsheviks at ?rst supposed that I was playing a practical joke. In the end,
however, she managed.
We met at Fenchurch Street on a Sunday, and at ?rst we were almost hostile
strangers to each other. She regarded my objections to the Bolsheviks as bour-
geois and senile and sentimental. I regarded her love of them with bewildered
horror. She had met men in Russia whose attitude seemed to her in every way
superior to mine. I had been ?nding the same consolation with Colette as I
used to ?nd during the War. In spite of all this, we found ourselves taking all
the necessary steps required for going o? together for a year in China. Some
force stronger than words, or even than our conscious thoughts, kept us
together, so that in action neither of us wavered for a moment. We had to work
literally night and day. From the time of her arrival to the time of our departure
for China was only ?ve days. It was necessary to buy clothes, to get passports in
order, to say goodbye to friends and relations, in addition to all the usual bustle
of a long journey; and as I wished to be divorced while in China, it was
necessary to spend the nights in o?cial adultery. The detectives were so stupid
that this had to be done again and again. At last, however, everything was in
order. Dora, with her usual skill, had so won over her parents that they came to
Victoria to see us o? just as if we had been married. This in spite of the fact that
they were completely and entirely conventional. As the train began to move
out of Victoria, the nightmares and complications and troubles of recent
months dropped o?, and a completely new chapter began.
the autobiography of bertrand russell 324LETTERS
From J. E. Littlewood
Trinity College
Cambridge
[1919]
Dear Russell
Einstein’s theory is completely con?rmed. The predicted displacement was
1''.72 and the observed 1''.75 ± .06.
Yours
J.E.L.
From Harold J. Laski
Harvard University
Cambridge
August 29, 1919
Dear Mr Russell
I wish I knew how to thank you at all adequately for your letter. When I
had ?nished that book I felt that I cared more for what you and Mr Justice
Holmes thought about it than for the opinion of any two living men; and to
have you not merely think it worth while, but agree with it is a very big thing
to me. So that if I merely thank you abruptly you will realise that it is not
from any want of warmth.
I have ventured to send you my ?rst book, which has probably all the vices
of the book one writes at twenty-three; but you may be interested in the ?rst
chapter and the appendices. And if you’ll allow me to, I’d like to send you
some more technical papers of mine. But I don’t want you to be bothered by
their presence, and allow them to interfere with your work.
My interest in liberal Catholicism really dates from 1913 when I read
Figgis’ Churches in the Modern State at Oxford; and while I was writing my ?rst
book I came to see that, historically, the church and the State have changed
places since the Reformation and that all the evils of uni?ed ecclesiastical
control are slowly becoming the technique of the modern State – if they have
not already become so: it then struck me that the evil of this sovereignty
could be shown fairly easily in the sphere of religion in its state-connection
where men might still hesitate to admit it in the economic sphere. The
second book tried to bridge the gap; and the book I’m trying now to write is
really an attempt to explain the general problem of freedom in institutional
terms. If by any lucky chance you have time to write I’d greatly like to send
you its plan and have your opinion on it.
There is a more private thing about which I would like you to know in case
you think there is a chance that you can help. I know from your Introduction to
russia 325Mathematical Logic that you think well of She?er who is at present in the
Philosophy Department here. I don’t know if you have any personal acquain-
tance with him. He is a jew and he has married someone of whom the
University does not approve; moreover he hasn’t the social qualities that
Harvard so highly prizes. The result is that most of his department is engaged
on a determined e?ort to bring his career here to an end. Hoernle, who is at
present its chairman, is certain that if someone can explain that She?er is worth
while the talk against him would cease; and he’s ?nished a paper on some
aspect of mathematical logic that he himself feels will give him a big standing
when it can get published. Myself I think that the whole thing is a combi-
nation of anti-semitism and that curious university worship of social prestige
which plays so large a part over here. Do you know anyone at Harvard well
enough to say (if you so think) that She?er ought to have a chance? Of course
I write this entirely on my own responsibility but I’m very certain that if
Lowell could know your opinion of She?er it would make a big di?erence to
his future. And if he left here I think he would ?nd it very di?cult to get
another post. Please forgive me for bothering you with these details.
I shall wait with immense eagerness for the Nation. I owe Massingham
many debts; but none so great as this.
Believe me
Yours very sincerely
Harold J. Laski
From this time onward I used to send periodical cables to President Lowell, explaining that She?er
was a man of the highest ability and that Harvard would be eternally disgraced if it dismissed
him either because he was a Jew or because it disliked his wife. Fortunately these cables just
succeeded in their object.
Harvard University
Cambridge
September 29, 1919
Dear Mr Russell
Thank you heartily for your letter. I am sending you some semi-legal
papers and a more general one on administration. The book I ventured to
send you earlier. I am very grateful for your kindness in wanting them.
And I am still more grateful for your word on She?er. I have given it to
Hoernle who will show it to the members of the Philosophy Department
and, if necessary, to Lowell. And I have sent copies to two members of the
Corporation who will ?ght if there is need. I don’t think there is anything
further to be done at the moment. It would do no good to write to Perry.
These last years, particularly twelve months in the War Department of the ??
have made him very conservative and an eager adherent of ‘correct form’. He
the autobiography of bertrand russell 326is the head and centre of the enemy forces and I see no good in trying to
move him directly. He wants respectable neo-Christians in the Department
who will explain the necessity of ecclesiastical sanctions; or, if they are not
religious, at least they must be materially successful. I don’t think universities
are ever destined to be homes of liberalism; and the American system is in the
hands of big business and dominated by its grosser ideals. Did you ever read
Veblen’s Higher Learning in America?
You may be interested to know that I have a graduate class at Yale this term
reading Roads to Freedom. I’ve never met Yale men before; but it was absorbingly
interesting to see their amazement that Marx and Bakunin and the rest could
be written of without abuse. Which reminds me that in any new edition of
that book I wish you would say a good word for Proudhon! I think his Du
Principe Fédératif and his Justice Dans La Révolution are two very great books.
And may I have a photograph with your name on it to hang in my study.
That would be an act of genuine nobility on your part.
Yours very sincerely
Harold J. Laski
Harvard University
Cambridge
November 2 1919
Dear Mr Russell
Many thanks for the photograph. Even if it is bad, it gives a basis to the
imagination and that’s what I wanted.
The matter with Perry is the war. He got converted to conscription, was at
Washington with the educational(!) section of the War O?ce and became
o?cialised. The result is that he looks aslant at all outside the ‘correct’ things
much as a sta? major who saw life from Whitehall and the Army and Navy
Club. He still means well – all New Englanders do; but he has lost hold of
Plato’s distinction between willing what is right and knowing what it is right
to will. I think he might be turned on She?er’s side if She?er would get his
paper out amid the applause of you and Whitehead and Lewis; but She?er is a
?nnicky little fellow and publication halts on his whims and fancies. I haven’t
given up hope, but I don’t dare to hope greatly.
Yale is really interesting, or perhaps all youth, when one is twenty-six, is
interesting. I ?nd that when one presents the student-mind with syndicalism
or socialism namelessly they take it as reasonable and obvious; attach the name
and they whisper to the parents that nameless abominations are being per-
petrated. I spoke for the striking police here the other day – one of those strikes
which makes one equally wonder at the endurance of the men and the
unimaginative stupidity of the o?cials. Within a week two papers and two
hundred alumni demanded my dismissal – teaching sovietism was what
russia 327urging that men who get $1100 and work 73 hours are justi?ed in striking
after 13 years agitation was called. As it happens Lowell does believe in
freedom of speech, so that I stay; but you get some index to the present
American state of mind.
Yours very sincerely
Harold J. Laski
Harvard University
Cambridge
December 4 1919
Dear Mr Russell
Hoernle tells me that She?er’s paper is on its way to you. May I tell you how
the position stands? Hocking and Hoernle de?nitely ?ght for his reappoint-
ment. Perry wavers on account of Huntingdon’s emphatic praise of She?er’s
work and says his decision will depend most largely on what you and Moore
of Chicago feel. So if you do approve of it, the more emphatic your telegram
the more helpful it will be. There is a real ?ghting chance at the moment.
Things here are in a terrible mess. Injunctions violating speci?c government
promises; arrest of the miners’ leaders because the men refused to go back;
recommendation of stringent legislation against ‘reds’; arrest of men in the
West for simple possession of an ??? card; argument by even moderates
like Eliot that the issue is a straight ?ght between labor and constitutional
government; all these are in the ordinary course of events. And neither Pound
nor I think the crest of the wave has been reached. Some papers have actually
demanded that the Yale University Press withdraw my books from circulation
because they preach ‘anarchy’. On the other hand Holmes and Brandeis
wrote (through Holmes) a magni?cent dissent in defence of freedom of
speech in an espionage act case. I’ve sent the two opinions to Massingham
and suggested that he show them to you.
This sounds very gloomy; but since America exported Lady Astor to
England there’s an entire absence of political comedy.
Yours very sincerely
Harold J. Laski
[Plus ?a change.]
Harvard University
Cambridge
January 5, 1919 [1920]
Dear Mr Russell
It was splendid to have your telegram about She?er’s paper. I am afraid we
are ?ghting a lost battle as it looks as if Hoernle will go to Yale, which means
the autobiography of bertrand russell 328the withdrawal of our main support. Harvard is determined to be socially
respectable at all costs. I have recently been interviewed by the Board of
Overseers to know (a) whether I believe in a revolution with blood (b)
whether I believe in the Soviet form of government (c) whether I do not
believe that the American form of government is superior to any other (d)
whether I believe in the right of revolution.
In the last three days they have arrested ?ve thousand socialists with a view
to deportation. I feel glad that Graham Wallas is going to try and get me home!
Yours very sincerely
Harold J. Laski
Harvard University
Cambridge
February 18th, 1920
Dear Mr Russell
Above all, warm congratulations on your return to Cambridge. That
sounds like a real return of general sanity. I hope you will not con?ne your
lectures to mathematical logic...
I sent you the other day a volume of Duguit’s my wife and I translated last
year; I hope you will ?nd time to glance at it. I am very eager to get away
from this country, as you guessed, but rather ba?ed as to how to do it. I see
no hope in Oxford and I know no one at all in Cambridge. Wallas is trying to
do something for me in London, but I don’t know with what success. I am
heartily sick of America and I would like to have an atmosphere again where
an ox does not tread upon the tongue.
Yours very sincerely
Harold Laski
16, Warwick Gardens
[London] W.14
2.1.22
Dear Russell
This enclosure formally. Informally let me quote from Rivers: We asked
him to stand as the labour candidate for London. This is part of his reply. ‘I
think that a distinct factor in my decision has been The Analysis of Mind which I
have now read really carefully. It is a great book, and makes me marvel at his
intellect. It has raised all kinds of problems with which I should like to deal,
and I certainly should not be able to do so if I entered on a political life. κτλ.’
What about Rivers, Joad, Delisle Burns, Cli?ord Allen as the nucleus of our
new utilitarians?
Yours
H. J. Laski
russia 329From Ludwig Wittgenstein
[a postcard]
Cassino
Provincia Caserta
Italy
9.2.19
Dear Russell
I don’t know your precise address but hope these lines will reach you
somehow. I am prisoner in Italy since November and hope I may communi-
cate with you after a three years interruption. I have done lots of logikal work
which I am dying to let you know before publishing it.
Ever yours
Ludwig Wittgenstein
[Postcard]
Cassino
10.3.19
You cann’t immagine how glad I was to get your cards! I am afraid though
there is no hope that we may meet before long. Unless you came to see me
here, but this would be too much joy for me. I cann’t write on Logic as I’m
not allowed to write more than 2 Cards (15 lines each) a week. I’ve written a
book which will be published as soon as I get home. I think I have solved our
problems ?naly. Write to me often. It will shorten my prison. God bless you.
Ever yours
Wittgenstein
13.3.19
Dear Russell
Thanks so much for your postcards dated 2nd and 3rd of March. I’ve had a
very bad time, not knowing wether you were dead or alive! I cann’t write on
Logic as I’m not allowed to write more than two . a week (15 lines each).
This letter is an ecception, it’s posted by an Austrian medical student who
goes home tomorrow. I’ve written a book called Logisch-Philosophische Abhandlung
containing all my work of the last 6 years. I believe I’ve solved our problems
?nally. This may sound arrogant but I cann’t help believing it. I ?nished the
book in August 1918 and two months after was made Prigioniere. I’ve got
the manuscript here with me. I wish I could copy it out for you; but it’s pretty
long and I would have no safe way of sending it to you. In fact you would not
understand it without a previous explanation as it’s written in quite short
remarks. (This of cours means that nobody will understand it; allthough I
believe it’s all as clear as crystall. But it upsets all our theory of truth, of
classes, of numbers and all the rest.) I will publish it as soon as I get home.
the autobiography of bertrand russell 330Now I’m a?raid this won’t be ‘before long’. And consequently it will be a long
time yet till we can meet. I can hardly immagine seeing you again! It will be
too much! I supose it would be impossible for you to come and see me here?
Or perhaps you think it’s collossal cheek of me even to think of such a thing.
But if you were on the other end of the world and I could come to you I would
do it.
Please write to me how you are, remember me to Dr Whitehead. Is old
Johnson still alive? Think of me often!
Ever yours
Ludwig Wittgenstein
[Cassino
12.6.19]
Lieber Russell!
Vor einigen Tagen schickte ich Dir mein Manuskript durch Keynes’s Vermittelung. Ich schrieb
damals nur ein paar Zeilen fuer Dich hinein. Seither ist nun Dein Buch ganz in meine Haende
gelangt und nun haette ich ein grosses Beduerfnis Dir einiges zu schreiben. – Ich haette nicht
geglaubt, dass das, was ich vor 6 Jahren in Norwegen dem Moore diktierte an Dir so spurlos
voruebergehen wuerde. Kurz ich fuerchte jetzt, es moechte sehr schwer fuer mich sein mich mit Dir
zu verstaendigen. Und der geringe Rest von Ho?nung mein Manuskript koenne Dir etwas sagen, ist
ganz verschwunden. Einen Komentar zu meinem Buch zu schreiben, bin ich wie Du Dir denken
kannst, nicht im Stande. Nur muendlich koennte ich Dir einen geben. Ist Dir irgend an dem
Verstaendnis der Sache etwas gelegen und kannst Du ein Zusammentre?en mit mir bewerkstelligen,
so, bitte, tue es. – Ist dies nicht moeglich, so sei so gut und schicke das Manuskript so bald Du es
gelesen hast auf sicherem Wege nach Wien zurueck. Es ist das einzige korrigierte Exemplar,
welches ich besitze und die Arbeit meines Lebens! Mehr als je brenne ich jetzt darauf es gedruckt zu
sehen. Es ist bitter, das vollendete Werk in der Gefangenschaft herumschleppen zu muessen und zu
sehen, wir der Unsinn draussen sein Spiel treibt! Und ebenso bitter ist es zu denken dass niemand es
verstehen wird, auch wenn es gedruckt sein wird! – Hast Du mir jemals seit Deinen zwei ersten
Karten geschrieben? Ich habe nichts erhalten.
Sei herzlichst gegruesst und glaube nicht, dass alles Dummheit ist was Du nicht
verstehen wirst.
Dein treuer
Ludwig Wittgenstein
[This and the following translations of Wittgenstein’s letters in German are
by B. F. McGuinness.]
[Cassino
12.6.19]
Dear Russell
Some days ago I sent you my manuscript, through Keynes’s good o?ces. I
enclosed only a couple of lines for you at the time. Since then your book
russia 331has arrived here safely and I now feel a great need to write you a number of
things. – I should never have believed that what I dictated to Moore in Norway six
years ago would pass over you so completely without trace. In short, I am afraid it
might be very di?cult for me to reach an understanding with you. And my
small remaining hope that my manuscript would convey something to you has
now quite vanished. Writing a commentary on my book is out of the question
for me, as you can imagine. I could only give you an oral one. If you attach any
importance whatsoever to understanding the thing, and if you can arrange a
meeting with me, please do so. – If that is impossible, then be so good as to
send the manuscript back to Vienna by a safe route as soon as you have read it.
It is the only corrected copy I possess and it is my life’s work! I long to see it in
print, now more than ever. It is bitter to have to lug the completed work around
with me in captivity and to see nonsense rampant in the world outside. And it is
just as bitter to think that no one will understand it even if it is printed! – Have
you written to me at all since your ?rst two cards? I have received nothing.
Kindest regards, and don’t suppose that everything that you won’t be able to understand is a
piece of stupidity!
Yours ever
Ludwig Wittgenstein
Cassino
19.8.1919
Dear Russell
Thanks so much for your letter dated 13 August. As to your queries, I
cann’t answer them now. For ?rstly I don’t know allways what the numbers
refer to, having no copy of the MS here. Secondly some of your questions
want a very lengthy answer and you know how di?cult it is for me to write
on logic. That’s also the reason why my book is so short, and consequently so
obscure. But that I cann’t help. – Now I’m a?raid you haven’t realy got hold
of my main contention, to which the whole business of logical props is only
a corolary. The main point is the theory of what can be expressed (gesagt) by
props – i.e. by linguage – (and, which comes to the same, what can be
