ANDRE MALRAUX
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be quite busy, and China, once an American colony-war with
Japan is inevitable.
After eating, while the others lingered over the table, we went
out into the garden. The sun was setting, the sun as beautiful as the
day before. The white of the houses scattered over the fields or
among the fringes of the forest, now dark, appeared bluish, with a
vague aspect of dull phosphorescence. Our conversation now was
less intense, less rigorous. He spoke to me of Lenin, of whose work
he is now writing; a work as important as
My
Life
(which Trotsky
does not like) in which he will treat all the themes of philosophy and
tactics that he has not yet explained. A cat rushed past us: one of
Trotsky's large wolfhounds was accompanying us.
AM:
Is it true that Lenin was very fond of kittens? You know that
Richelieu always used to have a basket full of kittens on his table.
LT:
Not only cats; Lenin loved all small things-especially chil–
dren . Perhaps because he did not have any. He simply adored
children. In art, his taste went back to the past. But he used to say
of artists: "One must let them work."
AM:
Did he expect of communism a new human type, or did he
foresee a certain continuity in this domain?
Trotsky thought a while. We were walking at the edge of the
sea, which caressed the rocks so gently - absolu te calm. "In effect a
new man," he replied . For him the perspectives of communism were
infinite. He became pensive again. I was thinking of all that he had
said to me that morning, and he was doubtless also thinking of the
same.
"But," I said, "it seems to me that for you ... ."
"No, at bottom, I think as he did," Trotsky answered.
In no way did he say this because of orthodoxy . It seemed to
me that in spite of the preparation of the revolution, civil war and
the taking of power, never had this problem been planted in such
form. Without doubt he wished to say that he foresaw first a con–
tinuity among human types; later an ever more pronounced separa–
tion. And I felt through him that Lenin, faced with a world in which
Marxism lacked proven data, wished to experiment. In a word: in
him the desire for knowledge led immediately to action .
It
was here,
more than in our political conversation, that I felt most keenly the
man of action.
The sea continued to caress the rocks as the night advanced.
L T:
Look, the important thing is to see clearly. What one can say of
communism is, above all-more clarity. We must liberate man
