Letter to Jan Frankel, March 31, 1939

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Diego Rivera's Defection

Dear Friend:

I received your letter with the enclosure. Many thanks. It came on time.

I also received a letter from Comrade Goldman concerning the propositions he made to the library and to some universities. That is all that can be done. If we succeed in this it will be excellent. If not, we will arrange something else.

Your proposition of sending an American doctor here is not advisable. Nothing is new other than an aggravation of the chronic things. The general name of my illness is “the sixties” and I do not believe that in New York you have a specialist for this malady.

I sent you the documents concerning the painter. I hope that they are in your possession. I believe it would be best that a special commission, established in New York, send the painter concrete questions either directly or through Comrade C[urtiss]. If Dobbs comes to Mexico, as seems likely, then you seem to have a very good investigator who can work here in the name of the Pan-American Committee. The same is true for [C.L.R.] James, if he comes in the next period. I do not know whether or not Jim [Cannon] is planning to come here for a week or so in order to discuss the French question. On the whole, you have enough possibilities for the investigation. But it must be done as promptly as possible in order to prevent the painter from expanding and aggrandizing his fantasies.

It is also necessary to prepare an explanation for our press, because I am sure that within the next days the “sensation” will appear in the Lovestoneite press, for he has communicated the news to them. And it will also appear in the bourgeois press.

Warmest greetings. , ,

Comradely,

L.D.