270
PARTISAN REVIEW
the class struggle, governed their actions
by the conviction that if a means to the
end of making life more fully livable
shows signs of decadence and exhaustion,
it is better to manage as best you can in
your own metier and not waste time feed–
ing a growth which must wither before it
grows strong.
It is easy to reproach these men in
trite party jargon. But what was their
alternative. To join the communist party
of Great Britain-known, ·Since the Sov–
iets have become our allies, as the Royal
Communist Party of Great Britain? For
my part, I would as soon dwell under
fascism which I abhor, as ally myself to
the servile uncritical orthodoxy, the
soured, uncharitable hypocrisy of the
party over here. The English
Daily Work–
er- rest its soul-was as dishonest and
spiteful a publication as anything the
capitalist press of this country has to be
ashamed of.
Most of the best minds who have turned
their attention away from politics are art–
ists and scholars.
It
never has been their
role to weld parties together; and the
side which should have been able to call
upon their support is divided by career–
ists who reserve their strongest hate not
for fascists, but for Trotskyists, revolu–
tionaries who derive their ideology from
the same roots as themselves.
At our universities communism remains
what it has always been there. Under–
graduates play at being communists as
Marie Antoinette played at being a milk
maid. There are a few splendid unsung
and isolated young fighting proletarians
in the junior ranks of the party. As I am
neither an artisan nor a social worker and
have adapted my life to my unfaith, I see
them less and less often.
With best wishes for the continued suc–
cess of P.R.
JoHN CHANDOS
LONDON, ENGLAND
