60
PARTISAN REVIEW
that 1 would do well to get out of the country that same day. They
gave me one of the suitcases they had taken.
It
was not heavy, which
meant they were keeping my manuscripts. The policeman accom–
panied me to the main entrance. "I suppose you'll be going home to
Mother ," he said, as he left me on the sidewalk.
1 saw Berlin again twenty-seven years later.
It
was no home–
coming, not even a return, but a ghostly visitation. None of my
friends were there any longer, none of the comrades with whom 1
had shared the last crumbs of a great hope.
...
...
...
1 spent the time from the spring of 1933 to May 1934 in Yugo–
slavia, with a long stay in Vienna and a week in Prague as interrup–
tions. 1 had been in Zagreb only a few days when 1 started giving lec–
tures which drew even larger audiences than my former ones. Utter
strangers, older and younger people, would come up to me; their joy
in my release moved me, gave me courage for my new conviction:
that out of errors and their consequences, and out of suffering one
can draw material for the meaning one has to give life precisely
when it is in dire peril and threatens to lose all its meaning.
Forty-three years separate me from that early summer in 1933,
the summer of a friendship which almost made me forget what had
happened and the horrors in the offing. Hardly any of the people
whose nearness filled me withjoy, and to whom 1 looked for unques–
tioning understanding, are still alive. Most of them fell victim to
violence....
One murdered friend was Djuka Cvijic, killed not by the Nazis
or the Ustachi, but by Stalin's men. One of the first leaders of the
Communist Party in Yugoslavia, he had been sent into exile on
orders from the Russians and later had been "shelved." ... Through
him 1 came into contact with those Yugoslavian communists who
directed the illegal party from Vienna. Among others 1 met the sec–
retary general, Milan Gorkic, and members of the Croatian Peasant
Movement. Yet of all these men, Djuka was the only one whose
human qualities and political astuteness inspired instant confidence
in me. That is why 1 never hesitated to carry out missions in Yugo–
slavia which might have been very dangerous for me. 1 took it for
granted that he had thought everything out, and had given me these
assignments for good reasons. Of course he was often wrong, as is
everyone who takes political positions and cannot avoid the necessity
