Letter to Pavel Axelrod, August 30, 1901

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Author(s) Lenin
Written 30 August 1901


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First published in 1925 in Lenin Miscellany III. Sent from Munich to Heiligenschwende. Printed from the original.
Source: Lenin Collected Works, Progress Publishers, 1971, Moscow, Volume 36, pages 96-97
Keywords : Letter, Pavel Axelrod

August 30, 1901

Dear P. B.,

I received your letter today, and today also sent off the proofs of my article[1] to Dietz. I have made the change you suggested—at the end, separating the liberals from the revolutionaries who had been designated together as “we”. But as regards the “providential slip”, I could do nothing about it: alteration of this passage would have required much too extensive changes; besides, the spirit of the whole article makes it impossible to alter it in the sense of eliminating the “one-sidedness” (you are right, of course, that the presentation is “one-sided”: how could one observe a judicious balance in a polemical article devoted to an attack on one of the flanks of our opponents! What I mean is that it’s not that I don’t see the defect here but that it lies too deep to be eliminated by one particular alteration).

We have been receiving all your letters. As regards my sister, I don’t know how matters stand, because I haven’t heard from her for quite a long time.

You have, of course, received Alexei’s letter describing the obstacle to the congress[2]? We shall wait and see how you and Danevich decide this matter.

The seventh issue[3] has appeared, and has of course been sent to you. In the eighth, there will be Ryazanov’s article, “The Imperial Drink Shop” (on the vodka monopoly); then we anticipate an article on the new law (of June 8) on land grants to nobles in Siberia.[4] In the social chronicle, there are reports on the liberals’ congress, the disgraceful treatment of exiles in Siberia, the deep unrest in out-of-the-way places like Kursk, and about the revolt of seminary and gymnasium students. We also have a very interesting article by a worker—a reply to Dadonov, who abused the Ivanovo-Voznesensk workers in Russkoye Bogatstvo.[5] It’s a very good article, they say (I haven’t read it yet), so that we don’t know where it should be best printed, in Iskra or in Zarya. In No. 8 of Iskra, there is a letter by Danevich from France.

We still have no foreign review for Zarya! Nor are we likely to have one on home affairs either.[6] It’s a misfortune! Meanwhile, Zarya is getting fatter and fatter. We already have 6 sheets+4 (Plekhanov’s “Critique”)+2 (him again, against Bernstein)+2 (Nevzorov+Alexei)+2 or 3 (Velika Dmitrievna and Starover).... As for me, I’m bogged down in the agrarian question.

Well, I hope we shall soon meet.

All the best,

Yours,

Petrov

  1. ↑ A reference to Lenin’s article, “The Persecutors of the Zemstvo and the Hannibals of Liberalism”. See Note 93.
  2. ↑ A reference to the “Unity” Conference of RSDLP Organisations Abroad held in Zurich on October 4 and 5, 1901. It was attended by six members of the Iskra and Zarya organisation abroad (among them V. I. Lenin, N. K. Krupskaya and Y. O. Martov), eight members of the Sotsial-Demokrat organisation ( including three members of the Emancipation of Labour group: G. V. Plekhanov, P. B. Axelrod and V. I. Zasulich), 16 members of the Union of Russian Social-Democrats (including five members of the Bund’s Committee Abroad), and three members of the Borba group. On the first item of the agenda, “Agreement in Principle and Instructions to Editorial Boards”, Lenin, who attended the Congress under the name of Frey, delivered an eloquent speech, exposing the Union’s opportunist activity. This was Lenin s first public speech before Russian Social-Democrats abroad. When the opportunist amendments and addenda to the June resolution, adopted by the Third Congress of the Union of Russian Social-Democrats, were announced at the Congress, the revolutionary section of the Congress (members of the Iskra and Zarya and the Sotsial-Demokrat organisations) read out a statement saying that unity was impossible and left the Congress. On Lenin’s initiative, these organisations in October 1901 united into the League of Russian Revolutionary Social-Democracy Abroad.
  3. ↑ Iskra No. 7.
  4. ↑ A reference to Lenin’s article “The Serf-Owners at Work” (see present edition, Vol. 5, pp. 95–100).
  5. ↑ A reference to the article “In Defence of the Ivanovo-Voznesensk Workers” by I. V. Babushkin, which was signed “A Worker for __PRINTERS_P_627_COMMENT__ 40* Workers” and appeared in a special supplement to Iskra No. 9, October 1901. It was in reply to V. Dadonov’s article, “Russian Manchester (Letters About Ivanovo-Voznesensk)”, published in Russkoye Bogatstvo No. 12, 1900.
    Russkoye Bogatstvo (Russian Wealth)—a monthly magazine published in St. Petersburg from 1876 to mid-1918. In the early 1890s, it was an organ of the liberal Narodniks. Beginning with 1906, it actually became an organ of the Popular Socialists, a semi-Cadet party.
  6. ↑ Review of Home Affairs for Zarya’s double issue No. 2–3, 1901, was written by Lenin (see present edition, Vol. 5, pp. 251–301).
    A review of foreign affairs for the same issue of Zarya was written by Y. O. Martov and signed “Ignotus”. It dealt with the Lübeck Congress of the German Social-Democratic Party.
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