Letter to Mikhail Borodin, July 8, 1920

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Comrade Gruzenberg,

Comrade Murphy has told me that the translation of the theses contains solecisms.

You must yourself undertake (or immediately organise a group to help) good editing of the translation of all the theses.

Consult the English comrades about this.

Regarding Wijnkoop: I have sent Radek his statement (written by Wijnkoop in English). Whether the English is good, I do not know. Take from Radek everything sent by me (if necessary, forward this letter to him), and check, please, if the English is good. (The content of the statement: the Dutch Party is not responsible for “Leftism”, the latter is the work of certain Dutchmen.)

(Print only this statement and my statement that I am introducing corrections in the text.[1])

Regarding the quality of the English translations, you must take good care and set up a group of responsible Englishmen (with their responsibility in written form), otherwise we shall be blamed (and so will you).

Greetings,

Yours,

Lenin

8/VII.

  1. ↑ In speaking of Wijnkoop’s statement, Lenin is referring to the letter from him of June 30, 1920, about the book “Left-Wing” Communism—an Infantile Disorder, with which the Dutch delegation became acquainted at the Second Congress of the Communist International before translations of the Russian text had been published. Wijnkoop’s letter and Lenin’s reply to it were first published in the English translation of the book, issued in Moscow in 1920, and in the Russian text of the book in 1930 in the second edition of Lenin’s Collected Works (see present edition, Vol. 31, pp. 117–18).