LETTERS
127
"friendship" for the October revolu–
tion.
The unhappy Soviet press, evidently
on orders from above, complains bit–
terly in these latter days of the "im–
poverishment" of scientific and artistic
production in the USSR and reproach–
es Soviet artists and writers with lack
of sincerity, courage and vitality. One
can't believe one's eyes: the boa con–
strictor delivers to the rabbit a homily
on independence and personal dignity.
Hideous and ignoble picture, but how
worthy of our time!
The struggle for revolutionary ideas
in art must begin once again with the
struggle for artistic
truth,
not in terms
of any single school, but in terms of
the immutable faith of the artist
in
his
own inner self.
Without this there is
no art. "You shall not lie!"-that
is
the formula of salvation.
Properly understood, the FIARI is
not an esthetic or political school and
cannot become one. But FIARI can
oxidize the atmosphere in which artists
breath and create. In our epoch of
convulsive reaction, of cultural decline
and return to savagery, truly indepen–
dent creation cannot but be revolution–
ary by its very nature, for it cannot
but seek 'an outlet from intolerable so–
cial suffocation. But art as a whole,
and each artist in particular, seeks this
outlet in ways proper to himself-not
relying upon orders from outside, but
rejecting such orders and heaping scorn
upon all who submit to them. To en–
courage such attitudes among the best
circles of artists-this is the
task
ol
the FIARI. I firmly believe that its
name will enter history.
Yours,
LEON TROTSKY
Coyoacan, D. F., Mexico
December 22, 1938
