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Authors: Julian Barnes
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and Stars and Stripes waistcoats marching down Fifth Avenue and trampling underfoot the starving proletariat. Any more than he expected a trumpeted land of freedom – he doubted such a place existed anywhere. Perhaps he had imagined a combination of technological advancement, social conformity, and the sober manners of a pioneering nation come into wealth. Ilf and Petrov, after taking a road-trip across the country, had written that thinking about America made them melancholy, while having the opposite effect on Americans themselves. They also reported that Americans, contrary to their own propaganda, were very passive by nature, since everything was pre-processed for them, from ideas to food. Even the cows standing motionless in the fields looked like advertisements for condensed milk.
His first surprise had been the behaviour of American journalists. There had been an advance guard of them at Frankfurt airport on the journey out, waiting in ambush. They bawled questions and shoved cameras into his face. There had been a cheerful rudeness about them, an assumption of superior values. The fact that they couldn’t pronounce your name was your name’s fault, not theirs. So they shortened it.
‘Hey, Shosti, look this way! Wave your hat at us!’
That had been later, at LaGuardia airport. Dutifully, he had raised his hat and waved it, as had his fellow delegates.
‘Hey, Shosti, give us a smile!’
‘Hey, Shosti, how do you like America?’
‘Hey, Shosti, do you prefer blondes or brunettes?’
Yes, they had even asked him that. If at home you were spied on by the men who smoked Belomory, here in America you were spied on by the press. After their plane had landed, a journalist had got hold of a stewardess and quizzed her about the behaviour of the Soviet delegation during the flight. She reported that they had chatted to their fellow passengers, and enjoyed drinking dry martinis and Scotch and soda. And such information was duly printed in the New York Times as if it were of interest!
Good things first. His suitcase was full of gramophone records and American cigarettes. He had heard the Julliards perform three Bartok quartets and had met them backstage afterwards. He had heard the New York Philharmonic under Stokowski in a programme of Panufnik, Virgil Thomson, Sibelius, Khachaturian and Brahms. He had himself played – with his small, ‘non-pianistic’ hands – the second movement of his Fifth Symphony at Madison Square Garden in front of 15,000 people. Their applause was thunderous, unstoppable, competitive. Well, America was the land of competition, so perhaps they wanted to prove they could clap longer and louder than Russian audiences. It had embarrassed him and – who knew? – perhaps the State Department as well. He had met some American artists who had received him most cordially: Aaron Copland, Clifford Odets, Arthur Miller, a young writer called Mailer. He had received a large scroll thanking him for his visit, signed by forty-two musicians from Artie Shaw to Bruno Walter. And there the good things ended. These had been his spoonfuls of honey in a barrel of tar.
He had hoped for some obscurity among the hundreds of other participants, but found to his dismay that he was the star name of the Soviet delegation. He had given a short speech on the Friday night and an immense one on the Saturday night. He had answered questions and posed for photographs. He was treated well; it was a public success – and also the greatest humiliation of his life. He felt nothing but self-disgust and self-contempt. It had been the perfect trap, the more so because the two parts of it were not connected. Communists at one end, capitalists at the other, himself in the middle. And nothing to do except scuttle through the brightly lit corridors of some experiment, as a series of doors opened in front of him and closed immediately behind him.
And it had all started again because of another trip Stalin had made to the opera.
His first surprise had been the behaviour of American journalists. There had been an advance guard of them at Frankfurt airport on the journey out, waiting in ambush. They bawled questions and shoved cameras into his face. There had been a cheerful rudeness about them, an assumption of superior values. The fact that they couldn’t pronounce your name was your name’s fault, not theirs. So they shortened it.
‘Hey, Shosti, look this way! Wave your hat at us!’
That had been later, at LaGuardia airport. Dutifully, he had raised his hat and waved it, as had his fellow delegates.
‘Hey, Shosti, give us a smile!’
‘Hey, Shosti, how do you like America?’
‘Hey, Shosti, do you prefer blondes or brunettes?’
Yes, they had even asked him that. If at home you were spied on by the men who smoked Belomory, here in America you were spied on by the press. After their plane had landed, a journalist had got hold of a stewardess and quizzed her about the behaviour of the Soviet delegation during the flight. She reported that they had chatted to their fellow passengers, and enjoyed drinking dry martinis and Scotch and soda. And such information was duly printed in the New York Times as if it were of interest!
Good things first. His suitcase was full of gramophone records and American cigarettes. He had heard the Julliards perform three Bartok quartets and had met them backstage afterwards. He had heard the New York Philharmonic under Stokowski in a programme of Panufnik, Virgil Thomson, Sibelius, Khachaturian and Brahms. He had himself played – with his small, ‘non-pianistic’ hands – the second movement of his Fifth Symphony at Madison Square Garden in front of 15,000 people. Their applause was thunderous, unstoppable, competitive. Well, America was the land of competition, so perhaps they wanted to prove they could clap longer and louder than Russian audiences. It had embarrassed him and – who knew? – perhaps the State Department as well. He had met some American artists who had received him most cordially: Aaron Copland, Clifford Odets, Arthur Miller, a young writer called Mailer. He had received a large scroll thanking him for his visit, signed by forty-two musicians from Artie Shaw to Bruno Walter. And there the good things ended. These had been his spoonfuls of honey in a barrel of tar.
He had hoped for some obscurity among the hundreds of other participants, but found to his dismay that he was the star name of the Soviet delegation. He had given a short speech on the Friday night and an immense one on the Saturday night. He had answered questions and posed for photographs. He was treated well; it was a public success – and also the greatest humiliation of his life. He felt nothing but self-disgust and self-contempt. It had been the perfect trap, the more so because the two parts of it were not connected. Communists at one end, capitalists at the other, himself in the middle. And nothing to do except scuttle through the brightly lit corridors of some experiment, as a series of doors opened in front of him and closed immediately behind him.
And it had all started again because of another trip Stalin had made to the opera.
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