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POLISH WRITERS
The editors of PARTISAN REVIEW
and a group of 34 of its contribu–
tors sent a cable of greetings to
the Polish Writers' Union whose
Congress was held recently in War–
saw. The text of the message read:
To the President of the Polish
Writers' Union
Dear Mr. President:
On the occasion of the Congress
of the Polish Writers' Association
now convening in Warsaw, we, the
editors and a group of contribu–
tors to PARTISAN REVIEW, send our
greetings to Polish writers, intel–
lectuals and students, who are
playing a leading and audacious
part in the struggle for national
liberation from Stalinist terror and
foreign domination. It is with the
utmost sympathy that we have fol–
lowed the movement toward de–
mocratization in your country, and
we hope that the progress of this
movement will soon enable your
people to determine freely their
form of government and social
system.
We believe that literature, art,
and creative thought can thrive
best only under conditions of free–
dom of expression and cultural au–
tonomy. Differences of opinion on
the economic organization of so–
ciety do not preclude a common
stand on this issue among intellec–
tuals the world over who prize lib–
erty, for the tragic experience of
our time has demonstrated that
demoralization and self-betrayal
result from the subjection of the
mind to dogmas imposed by states
and parties. We look forward to
the restoration of personal and in-
teilectual contact between the
writers of your country and ours.
The cable of greetings was
signed by William Phillips and
Philip Rahv, as editors, and by
Newton Arvin, William Barrett,
J acques Barzun, Saul Bellow, Eric
Bentley, Harvey Breit, Richard
Chase, Robert Gorham Davis, Al–
len Dowling, F. W. Dupee, Ralph
Ellison, Leslie A. Fiedler, Clement
Greenberg, Horace Gregory, Eliza–
beth Hardwick, Sidney Hook, Irv–
ing Howe, Alfred Kazin, Louis
Kronenberger, Max Lerner, Rob–
ert Lowell, Mary McCarthy, Le–
nore Marshall, Marianne Moore,
Reinhold Niebuhr, Meyer Scha–
piro, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.,
Jean Stafford, James Johnson
Sweeney, Mark Van Doren, Mor–
ton White, and William Carlos
Williams.
On December 15, 1956, the fol–
lowing reply was received:
The newly elected board of the
Polish Writers' Union cordially
thanks you for your good wishes
and kind words of appreciation on
the occasion of our Congress. We
look forward to establishing the
closest possible contacts with
American writers as with writers
throughout the world.
The reply was signed by Antoni
Slonimski, newly elected president
of the Writers' Union. Slonimski,
one of the foremost Polish poets,
has never been a Party member,
and lived in exile in London dur–
ing the war and for some years
after it.
