DIANA TRILLING
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DM:
Yes, something like that, or at least to be antagonistic . Of
course, we were very careful to avoid the deadly subject of Stalin .
DT:
At what session did Lillian Hellman make the remark attri–
buted to her by Garry Wills in the introduction to
Scoundrel Time,
that you don't insult your host at the table?
DM:
That was directed at us , of course . But she wasn't in this ses–
sion at all and I never saw her there . She was in the big public ses–
sion which we also attended but didn't say anything because we
didn't have that much nerve . You know, they had a big dinner
and so on, something like that. She wasn't at the critics' session .
DT:
I take it that you've just re-read
Scoundrel Time.
Would you like
to comment on it while you have it freshly in mind?
DM:
I thought it was an absolutely disgusting book. And as a matter
of fact, I've been quite friendly with Lillian for a long time, espe–
cially after she signed the protest I got up about Siniavski and
Daniel in 1969, which I think was a turning point politically for
her ' because in three distinct places in this book you'll see, if you
read it carefully, she's given up on Stalinism. She says in so many
words, I was wrong about it. But she then goes on to say that the
people who really were wrong and vicious and bad for America
were
us,
you know . That's why I think it's a silly book and also a
very dishonest book. The reason I think it's a dishonest book pri–
marily is that she gives us this self-dramatizing impression that
she was isolated, that the liberals didn't help her, that nobody
helped her. The book itself makes clear that this isn't true, that
even Arthur Krock wrote her a letter saying, I admire your stand
but not your politics, et cetera, et cetera. I mean, if you read the
book you'll see all through it that everybody is on her side. Not
politically, but for civil liberties. But she has the gall to say, and
the dishonesty to say, that she didn't get any support. What she
means is that nobody was on her side as a Stalinist. And why the
hell should we be? She was then still a Stalinist. [Dashiell] Ham–
mett of course made no bones about being a Communist. She
supported the whole Wallace business , she apologized for the rape
of Czechoslovakia, and all that kind of stuff. That's why this book
is so really disgusting. I don't understand why she writes this all
up now and pretends that she's the Joan of Arc and so on-
DT:
Because a new generation only knows that there was a phe–
nomenon called McCarthyism. They take her to be a symbol of
the forces that withstood McCarthy.
DM:
Well, that's true to some extent, of course . And it's probably
