Published:
First published in 1929 in the journal Proletarskaya Revolyutsiya No. 11.
Sent from Geneva.
Printed from
the original.
Source:
Lenin
Collected Works,
Progress Publishers,
1977,
Moscow,
Volume 37,
pages 376-377.
Translated: The Late George H. Hanna
Transcription\Markup:
D. Moros
Public Domain:
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Her Excellency Maria Ilyinichna Ulyanova,
Pavlovskaya Street, 6, Apt. 16,
Peterburgskaya Storona,
St. Petersburg,
Russia
February 7, 1908
Dear Manyasha,
I have received your letter of January 20, a letter from the young writer on the same subject, and today I received Rech.[2] I am very, very grateful for the newspaper, the article is really extremely interesting!
With regard to Webb—I have written to the young writer and have sent him something in the nature of power of attorney. In any case I repeat (1) I do not know how many copies of the first edition there were; (2) Struve was the manager of the editorial office at that time and he edited the first volume; (3) the second volume was translated by Y. Smirnov (Gurevich). I then received 20 rubles for a printer’s signature for the translation of the first volume and 10 rubles a signature for editing the second. Let the young writer haggle—if need be, let him go down to a half of that, provided the contract is concluded for a definite number of copies.
Yesterday I also received a letter from a colleague about Granat. Things are working out quite well for me there.
As regards our marriage lines and the palm oil wanted in Krasnoyarsk, I propose that you should not take too much trouble or give any large quantity of palm oil. It looks as if we shall manage without it.
In a month, if not sooner, we intend to set up our own apartment here.
With regard to the symposium in memory of Marx, it does not seem likely that I shall take part in it, either; such things cannot be written in a hurry.[3]
Our people are taking a surprisingly long time to get well! It’s too bad. The influenza this year must be particularly malignant, or else you are having very bad weather. Write and tell me how Mother is.
I have not yet fully settled down here—for instance, I have not yet joined my “club”, where it is convenient to read periodicals and easy to obtain new books.[4] I shall try (as soon as I have joined—probably in a day or two) to find whatever I can for you to translate. Do you receive Neue Zeit? In the science supplement to No. 1 there is an article by Kautsky “Nationalität und Internationalist”. I have not yet seen it. Is it not suitable for translation? I have read Kautsky’s Sozialismus und Kolonialpolitik (a new pamphlet of 80 pages). I think it would be permitted. Talk to Zerno[1] [5] about it; it would be a good thing to translate it. I am also surprised that no announcement is to be seen of a translation of Parvus’s Kolonialpolitik und Zusammenbruch. Has no one any initiative? Ask Zerno. I could get in touch with the author here, abroad.
All the best, kiss Mother for me.
P.S. I have not received Bench’s Selected Works.
Of the trade union journals I have received Gudok and Tekstilnoye delo. In future please send all such publications.
[1] Please ask them at the same time whether I may send new things for you to their address, things that may be suitable for translation.—Lenin
[2] Rech (Speech)—organ of the Constitutional-Democratic (Cadet) Party published daily in St. Petersburg. Lenin probably referred to Rech No. 12 of January 15 (28), 1908, which carried an article entitled “Resolution of the Baku Social-Democrats Against Expropriation and Terror”.
[3] Lenin nevertheless wrote an article for the symposium Karl Marx (1818–1883), entitled “Marxism and Revisionism” (see Collected Works, Vol. 15, pp. 29–39).
[4] The club referred to is the Société de lecture (Reading Society) in Geneva; to work in the reading-room it was necessary to be a member of it and pay a certain fee. Lenin had worked there in 1904–05, before he left for Russia.
[5] Zerno (Grain or The Seed) was a publishing house headed by M. S. Kedrov; in 1907 it launched the publication of a collection of Lenin’s works under the general title of Twelve Years. It was planned as a three-volume edition but only the first volume and Part I of the second appeared. Volume I appeared in November 1907 (the date on the cover was 1908) and was confiscated soon after its appearance, although a large part of this first printing was saved and was distributed illegally.
Zerno published a symposium on the twenty-fifth anniversary of Marx’s death and the Kalendar dlya vsekh (Calendar for All) for 1908, which carried Lenin’s article “The International Socialist Congress in Stuttgart” (see Collected Works, Vol. 13, pp. 82- 93).
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