V. I.   Lenin

36

To:   MAXIM GORKY


Written: Written after March 6, 1913
Published: First published in 1924 in Lenin Miscellany I. Sent from Cracow to Capri. Printed from the original.
Source: Lenin Collected Works, Progress Publishers, [1976], Moscow, Volume 35, page 92.
Translated: Andrew Rothstein
Transcription\Markup: R. Cymbala
Public Domain: Lenin Internet Archive.   You may freely copy, distribute, display and perform this work, as well as make derivative and commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet Archive” as your source.README


Dear A. M.,

I have read the “Manifesto”[1] today....

It seems there is a complete amnesty for writers. You should try to get hack—having first found out, of course, whether they won’t play you a dirty trick on account of theschool”,[2] etc. Probably they won’t be able to prosecute you for this.

I hope you don’t take the view that one mustn’t “accept” an amnesty? This would he wrong. A revolutionary, as things are today, will do more from inside Russia, and our deputies even sign “the solemn oath”.

But you don’t have to sign anything, only to make use of the amnesty. Drop me a line about your opinion and your plans. Perhaps you will call here it you do move— after all, it’s on your way!

And for a revolutionary writer to have the possibility of roaming around Russia (the new Russia) means that he is afterwards able to hit a hundred limes harder at the Romanovs and Co....

Did you get my last letter? Somehow we haven’t had news from you for a long time. Are you well?

Yours,
Lenin

P.S. Did you get the letter from N. K. with the material?


Notes

[1] The “Manifesto” referred to is the amnesty decree promulgated in connection with the 300th anniversary of the House of the Romanovs.

[2] Reference is to a school on Capri organised by the Vperyod group in 1909 with Gorky’s participation.


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