Letter to Maria Alexandrovna Ulyanova, December 17, 1902

From Marxists-en
Jump to navigation Jump to search
Author(s) Lenin
Written 17 December 1902


MIA-bannière.gif
First published in 1929 in the journal Proletarskaya Revolyutsiya No. 11. Sent from London to Samara. Printed from the original.
Source: Lenin Collected Works, Progress Publishers, 1977, Moscow, Volume 37, pages 352-353
Collection(s): Proletarskaya Revolyutsiya
Keywords : Letter, Maria Alexandrovna Ulyanova

December 17, 1902

Mother dearest,

A few days ago we received Manyasha’s letter to Nadya with your postscript and I was very glad to hear from you because there had been no news for a long time. There was also a short letter from Anyuta; she seems to be well content with her new place. Manyasha writes that you will soon be seeing Mitya and his wife.[1] Give him very best regards from me and all of us. Perhaps Anyuta will visit you, too, and you will all be together for a short while during the holidays. That would be fine.

Our life here goes on just the same as usual. It was cold for a few weeks (cold here means “not thawing”) but there was no snow and we all caught colds. But we are all right now. The weather is again wet—at this rate I shall soon get unused to our winter!

I see from Manyasha’s letter that she liked Zheleznov’s book. I have not read it, of course; I merely turned over the pages, and so cannot undertake to judge. When I have read it, I will write about it. What I wrote concerned only the first, superficial impression.

Manyasha also writes that she has taken up languages, even English. I thought of sending her a textbook on pronunciation, a very good one, in German. I have been doing some study lately and am very pleased with the book; I can’t praise it enough. The book is, Henry Sweet, Elementarbuch des gesprochenen Englisch, Oxford, 1901, and it costs something like a ruble twenty-five kopeks. If Manyasha would like me to, I can send it; I do not need it any more. Since she has Toussaint, however, I don’t know whether it is worth while, because Toussaint is excellent. I used not to believe in this system but now I am sure it is the only serious, efficient system. If you take a few lessons from a native foreigner after working through the first part of Toussaint you can certainly acquire a thorough knowledge of the language. There are Toussaint dictionaries now as well, in which the pronunciation is indicated; I strongly advise Manyasha to buy them because our Alexandrov is wrong in many cases. (For instance, I strongly advise her to buy Muret’s pocket dictionary that uses the Toussaint method, Taschenwörterbuch der englischen und deutschen Sprache, Teil I, Englisch-deutsch, Preis 2 Mark. ,Berlin, 1902. Langenscheidtsche Verlagsbuchhandlung.)

Well, I have used up a lot of paper talking about books.... I want to order Problemy idealizma—this seems to be a “militant” review by the nonsense-mongering gentlemen.[2]

Y.V. and Nadya send their regards. I hope you will soon be receiving visitors and have some relief from your loneliness.

I embrace you fondly, my dear.

Yours,

V. Ulyanov

  1. ↑ Lenin’s brother and his wife visited Samara in the winter of 1902.—Ed.
  2. ↑ The symposium contained articles by S. N. Bulgakov, Prince Y. N. Trubetskoi, N. A. Berdyayev, S. L. Frank, Prince S. N. Trubetskoi, S. F. Oldenburg and others.
Retrieved from "https://wikirouge.net/texts/en/w/index.php?title=Letter_to_Maria_Alexandrovna_Ulyanova,_December_17,_1902&oldid=66952"