368
cused Mr. Del Vayo of carrying
through a consistently pro-Soviet
policy, and
The Nation's
peculiarly
unliberal rejoinder loo,s very much
like an attempt to shut off politi–
cal discussion of its policy when
it touches its most sensitive spot.
But to return to Mr. Werth.
Something should be said of his
devious tactics in replying to the
strictures of Justin O'Brien, who
accused
him
of distorting what
french writers thought of Gide. Mr.
Werth had made much of a sym–
posium in
Combat
some two years
ago, in which, he said, "dozens"
of young French writers expressed
"almost unanimous hostility" to
Gide. -This is a fair sample of Mr.
Werth's accuracy as a reporter:
the fact is that the participants in
the symposium, instead of "doz–
ens," were only thirteen, of which
the greater number, far from being
unanimously hostile, were favor–
able to Gide. He also distorted
the meaning of Mauriac's obituary
notice and that of other Catholic
literary men, ignoring the fact that
of all French writers of the modern
period it was
Gide
who was most
assiduously courted by the Catho–
lics and that time and again he
disappointed them by resisting their
efforts to convert him. Nor is Mr.
Werth any more reliable in his re-
ference to Sartre's appreciation of
Gide in
Les Temps Modernes.
Al–
though admitting that Sartre's
praise was "wholehearted," he cites
Sartre's remark on the habitual
hypocrisy of official opinion as re–
flected in some of the obituary
articles, as
if
that proved Gide's
unworthiness. In his original piece
Mr. Werth had reported that
French opinion was wholly unfa–
vorable to Gide; yet when forced
to admit that there had indeed
been widespread praise of him, he
tries to discredit it as hypocritical
and official.
But Mr. Werth's own opinion
is
nothing if not official. What is the
all but explicit charge of collabora–
tion with the Germans
if
not the
official charge made by the Com–
munist press? There
is
about as
much truth in it as there is
in
the
charge that the old Bolsheviks
worked for Hitler and the Mikado
or that all the opponents of Soviet
aggression are in the pay of Wall
Street. The Stalinists and their
"liberal" collaborators are such past
masters in the art of political libel
that their cry of injured innocence,
when called to account for their
own cant and duplicity, would be
farcical
if
so
much were not at
stake.
The Editors
the hans hofmann school of fine arts
52 west 8th street
new york city
phone gramercy 7-3491
provincetown, mass.
summer session
personally conducted
by mr. hofmann
june
8 -
aug. 31 approved G.!. Bill
of
Rights
