Le Lun Jan 29 2001 - 20:20:05 +0100
Karsten Johansen <kvjohans@online.no> a écrit:
> (PS: Kaj Skagen viser i sin kronikk til et forord til "Animal Farm" av
> Orwell som ble holdt skjult til 1972 - kan noen tipse om hvor man kan
> lese dette?)
Du finn det her: http://home.iprimus.com.au/korob/Orwell.html
Oddmund Garvik
<<<<<<<
THE FREEDOM OF THE PRESS
This book was first thought of, so far as the central idea goes, in 1937,
but was not written down until about the end of 1943. By the time when it
came to be written it was obvious that there would be great difficulty in
getting it published (in spite of the present book shortage which ensures
that anything describable as a book will 'sell'), and in the event it was
refused by four publishers. Only one of these had any ideological motive.
Two had been publishing anti-Russian books for years, and the other had no
noticeable political colour. One publisher actually started by accepting
the book, but after making the preliminary arrangements he decided to
consult the Ministry of Information, who appear to have warned him, or at
any rate strongly advised him, against publishing it. Here is an extract
from his letter:
I mentioned the reaction I had had from an important official in the
Ministry of Information with regard to Animal Farm. I must confess that
this expression of opinion has given me seriously to think ... I can see
now that it might be regarded as something which it was highly
ill-advised to publish at the present time. If the fable were addressed
generally to dictators and dictatorships at large then publication would
be all right, but the fable does follow, as I see now, so completely the
progress of the Russian Soviets and their two dictators, that it can apply
only to Russia, to the exclusion of the other dictatorships.
Another thing: it would be less offensive if the predominant caste in the
fable were not pigs. [It is not quite clear whether this suggested
modification is Mr ... 's own idea, or originated with the Ministry of
Information; but it seems to have the official ring about it - Orwell's
Note] I think the choice of pigs as the ruling caste will no doubt give
offence to many people, and particularly to anyone who is a bit
touchy, as undoubtedly the Russians are.
This kind of thing is not a good symptom. Obviously it is not desirable
that a government department should have any power of censorship (except
security censorship, which no one objects to in war time) over books which
are not officially sponsored. But the chief danger to freedom of thought
and speech at this moment is not the direct interference of the MOI or any
official body. If publishers and editors exert themselves to keep certain
topics out of print, it is not because they are frightened of prosecution
but because they are frightened of public opinion. In this country
intellectual cowardice is the worst enemy a writer or journalist has to
face, and that fact does not seem to me to have had the discussion it
deserves.
Any fairminded person with journalistic experience will admit that during
this war official censorship has not been particularly irksome. We have
not been subjected to the kind of totalitarian 'co-ordination' that it
might have been reasonable to expect. The press has some justified
grievances, but on the whole the Government has behaved well
and has been surprisingly tolerant of minority opinions.
The sinister fact about literary censorship in England is that it is
largely voluntary. Unpopular ideas can be silenced, and inconvenient facts
kept dark, without the need for any official ban. Anyone who has lived
long in a foreign country will know of instances of sensational items of
news - things which on their own merits would get the big headlines -
being kept right out of the British press, not because the Government
intervened, but because of a general tacit agreement that 'it wouldn't do'
to mention that particular fact. So far as the daily newspapers go, this
is easy to understand. The British press is extremely centralized, and
most of it is owned by wealthy men who have every motive to be dishonest
on certain important topics. But the same kind of veiled censorship also
operates in books and periodicals, as well as in plays, films and radio.
At any given moment there is an orthodoxy, a body of ideas which
it is assumed that all right-thinking people will accept without question.
It is not exactly forbidden to say this, that or the other, but it is 'not
done' to say it, just as in mid-Victorian times it was 'not done' to
mention trousers in the presence of a lady. Anyone who challenges the
prevailing orthodoxy finds himself silenced with surprising effectiveness.
A genuinely unfashionable opinion is almost never given a fair hearing,
either in the popular press or in the highbrow periodicals.
At this moment what is demanded by the prevailing orthodoxy is an
uncritical admiration of Soviet Russia. Every-one knows this, nearly
everyone acts on it. Any serious criticism of the Soviet régime, any
disclosure of facts which the Soviet government would prefer to keep
hidden, is next door to unprintable. And this nation-wide conspiracy to
flatter our ally takes place, curiously enough, against a background of
genuine intellectual tolerance. For though you are not allowed to
criticize the Soviet government, at least you are reasonably free to
criticize our own. Hardly anyone will print an attack on Stalin, but it is
quite safe to attack Churchill, at any rate in books and periodicals. And
throughout five years of war, during two or three of which we were
fighting for national survival, countless books, pamphlets and articles
advocating a compromise peace have been published without interference.
More, they have been published without exciting much disapproval. So
long as the prestige of the USSR is not involved, the principle of free
speech has been reasonably well upheld. There are other forbidden topics,
and I shall mention some of them presently, but the prevailing attitude
towards the USSR is much the most serious symptom. It is, as it were,
spontaneous, and is not due to the action of any pressure group.
The servility with which the greater part of the English intelligentsia
have swallowed and repeated Russian propaganda from 1941 onwards would be
quite astounding if it were not that they have behaved similarly on
several earlier occasions. On one controversial issue after another the
Russian viewpoint has been accepted without examination and then
publicized with complete disregard to historical truth or intellectual
decency. To name only one instance, the BBC celebrated the twenty-fifth
anniversary of the Red Army without mentioning Trotsky. This was about as
accurate as commemorating the battle of Trafalgar without mentioning
Nelson, but it evoked no protest from the English intelligentsia. In the
internal struggles in the various occupied countries, the British press
has in almost all cases sided with the faction favoured by the Russians
and libelled the opposing faction, sometimes suppressing material evidence
in order to do so. A particularly glaring case was that of Colonel
Mihailovich, the Jugoslav Chetnik leader. The Russians, who had their own
Jugoslav protégé in Marshal Tito, accused Mihailovich of collaborating
with the Germans. This accusation was promptly taken up by the British
press: Mihailovich's supporters were given no chance of answering it, and
facts contradicting it were simply kept out of print. In July of 1943 the
Germans offered a reward of 100,000 gold crowns for the capture of Tito,
and a similar reward for the capture of Mihailovich. The British press
'splashed' the reward for Tito, but only one paper mentioned (in small
print) the reward for Mihailovich: and the charges of collaborating with
the Germans continued. Very similar things happened during the Spanish
civil war. Then, too, the factions on the Republican side which the
Russians were determined to crush were recklessly libelled in the English
leftwing press, and any statement in their defence even in letter form,
was refused publication. At present, not only is serious criticism of the
USSR considered reprehensible, but even the fact of the existence of such
criticism is kept secret in some cases. For example, shortly before his
death Trotsky had written a biography of Stalin. One may assume that it
was not an altogether unbiased book, but obviously it was saleable. An
American publisher had arranged to issue it and the book was in print - I
believe the review copies had been sent out - when the USSR entered the
war. The book was immediately withdrawn. Not a word about this has ever
appeared in the British press, though clearly the existence of such a
book, and its suppression, was a news item worth a few paragraphs.
It is important to distinguish between the kind of censorship that the
English literary intelligentsia voluntarily impose upon themselves, and
the censorship that can sometimes be enforced by pressure groups.
Notoriously, certain topics cannot be discussed because of 'vested
interests'. The best-known case is the patent medicine racket. Again, the
Catholic Church has considerable influence in the press and can silence
criticism of itself to some extent. A scandal involving a Catholic priest
is almost never given publicity, whereas an Anglican priest who gets into
trouble (e.g. the Rector of Stiffkey) is headline news. It is very rare
for anything of an anti-Catholic tendency to appear on the stage or in a
film. Any actor can tell you that a play or film which attacks or makes
fun of the Catholic Church is liable to be boycotted in the press and
will probably be a failure. But this kind of thing is harmless, or at
least it is understandable. Any large organization will look after its own
interests as best it can, and overt propaganda is not a thing to object
to. One would no more expect the Daily Worker to publicize unfavourable
facts about the USSR than one would expect the Catholic Herald to denounce
the Pope. But then every thinking person knows the Daily Worker and the
Catholic Herald for what they are. What is disquieting is that where the
USSR and its policies are concerned one cannot expect intelligent
criticism or even, in many cases, plain honesty from Liberal writers and
journalists who are under no direct pressure to falsify their opinions.
Stalin is sacrosanct and certain aspects of his policy must not be
seriously discussed. This rule has been almost universally observed since
1941, but it had operated, to a greater extent than is sometimes realized,
for ten years earlier than that. Throughout that time, criticism of the
Soviet régime from the left could only obtain a hearing with difficulty.
There was a huge output of anti-Russian literature, but nearly all of it
was from the Conservative angle and manifestly dishonest, out of date and
actuated by sordid motives. On the other side there was an equally huge
and almost equally dishonest stream of pro-Russian propaganda, and what
amounted to a boycott on anyone who tried to discuss all-important
questions in a grown-up manner. You could, indeed, publish anti-Russian
books, but to do so was to make sure of being ignored or misrepresented by
nearly the whole of the highbrow press. Both publicly and privately you
were warned that it was 'not done'. What you said might possibly
be true, but it was 'inopportune' and 'played into the hands of' this or
that reactionary interest. This attitude was usually defended on the
ground that the international situation, and the urgent need for an
Anglo-Russian alliance, demanded it; but it was clear that this was a
rationalization. The English intelligentsia, or a great part of it, had
developed a nationalistic loyalty towards the USSR, and in their hearts
they felt that to cast any doubt on the wisdom of Stalin was a kind of
blasphemy. Events in Russia and events elsewhere were to be judged by
different standards. The endless executions in the purges of 1936-8 were
applauded by life-long opponents of capital punishment, and it was
considered equally proper to publicize famines when they happened in India
and to conceal them when they happened in the Ukraine. And if this was
true before the war, the intellectual atmosphere is certainly no better
now.
But now to come back to this book of mine. The reaction towards it of most
English intellectuals will be quite simple: 'It oughtn't to have been
published'. Naturally, those reviewers who understand the art of
denigration will not attack it on political grounds but on literary ones.
They will say that it is a dull, silly book and a disgraceful waste of
paper. This may well be true, but it is obviously not the whole of the
story. One does not say that a book 'ought not to have been published'
merely because it is a bad book. After all, acres of rubbish are printed
daily and no one bothers. The English intelligentsia, or most of them,
will object to this book because it traduces their Leader and (as they see
it) does harm to the cause of progress. If it did the opposite they would
have nothing to say against it, even if its literary faults were ten times
as glaring as they are. The success of, for instance, the Left Book Club
over a period of four or five years shows how willing they are to tolerate
both scurrility and slipshod writing, provided that it tells them what
they want to hear.
The issue involved here is quite a simple one: Is every opinion, however
unpopular - however foolish, even - entitled to a hearing? Put it in that
form and nearly any English intellectual will feel that he ought to say
'Yes'. But give it a concrete shape, and ask, 'How about an attack on
Stalin? Is that entitled to a hearing?', and the answer more often than
not will be 'No'. In that case the current orthodoxy happens to be
challenged, and so the principle of free speech lapses. Now, when one
demands liberty of speech and of the press, one is not demanding absolute
liberty. There always must be, or at any rate there always will be, some
degree of censorship, so long as organized societies endure. But freedom,
as Rosa Luxembourg said, is 'freedom for the other fellow'. The same
principle is contained in the famous words of Voltaire: 'I detest what
you say; I will defend to the death your right to say it'. If the
intellectual liberty which without a doubt has been one of the
distinguishing marks of western civilization means anything at all, it
means that everyone shall have the right to say and to print what he
believes to be the truth, provided only that it does not harm the rest of
the community in some quite unmistakable way. Both capitalist democracy
and the western versions of Socialism have till recently taken that
principle for granted. Our Government, as I have already pointed out,
still makes some show of respecting it. The ordinary people in the street
- partly, perhaps, because they are not sufficiently interested in ideas
to be intolerant about them - still vaguely hold that 'I suppose
everyone's got a right to their own opinion'. It is only, or at any rate
it is chiefly, the literary and scientific intelligentsia, the very people
who ought to be the guardians of liberty, who art beginning to despise it,
in theory as well as in practice.
One of the peculiar phenomena of our time is the renegade Liberal. Over
and above the familiar Marxist claim that 'bourgeois liberty' is an
illusion, there is now a widespread tendency to argue that one can only
defend democracy by totalitarian methods. If one loves democracy, the
argument runs, one must crush its enemies by no matter what means. And who
are its enemies? It always appears that they are not only those who attack
it openly and consciously, but those who 'objectively' endanger it by
spreading mistaken doctrines. In other words, defending democracy involves
destroying all independence of thought. This argument was used, for
instance, to justify the Russian purges. The most ardent Russophile hardly
believed that all of the victims were guilty of all the things they were
accused of. But by holding heretical opinions they 'objectively' harmed
the régime, and therefore it was quite right not only to massacre them but
to discredit them by false accusations. The same argument was used to
justify the quite conscious lying that went on in the leftwing press about
the Trotskyists and other Republican minorities in the Spanish civil war.
And it was used again as a reason for yelping against habeas corpus when
Mosley was released in 1943.
These people don't see that if you encourage totalitarian methods, the
time may come when they will be used against you instead of for you. Make
a habit of imprisoning Fascists without trial, and perhaps the process
won't stop at Fascists. Soon after the suppressed Daily Worker had been
reinstated, I was lecturing to a workingmen's college in South London. The
audience were working-class and lower-middle class intellectuals - the
same sort of audience that one used to meet at Left Book Club branches.
The lecture had touched on the freedom of the press, and at the end, to my
astonishment, several questioners stood up and asked me: Did I not think
that the lifting of the ban on the Daily Worker was a great mistake? When
asked why, they said that it was a paper of doubtful loyalty and ought not
to be tolerated in war time. I found myself defending the Daily Worker,
which has gone out of its way to libel me more than once. But where had
these people learned this essentially totalitarian outlook? Pretty
certainly they had learned it from the Communists themselves! Tolerance
and decency are deeply rooted in England, but they are not indestructible,
and they have to be kept alive partly by conscious effort. The result of
preaching totalitarian doctrines is to weaken the instinct by means of
which free peoples know what is or is not dangerous. The case of Mosley
illustrates this. In 1940 it was perfectly right to intern Mosley, whether
or not he had committed any technical crime. We were fighting for our
lives and could not allow a possible quisling to go free. To keep him shut
up, without trial, in 1943 was an outrage. The general failure to see this
was a bad symptom, though it is true that the agitation against Mosley's
release was partly factitious and partly a rationalization of other
discontents. But how much of the present slide towards Fascist ways of
thought is traceable to the 'anti-Fascism' of the past ten years and the
unscrupulousness it has entailed?
It is important to realize that the current Russomania is only a symptom
of the general weakening of the western liberal tradition. Had the MOI
chipped in and definitely vetoed the publication of this book, the bulk of
the English intelligentsia would have seen nothing disquieting in this.
Uncritical loyalty to the USSR happens to be the current orthodoxy, and
where the supposed interests of the USSR are involved they are willing to
tolerate not only censorship but the deliberate falsification of history.
To name one instance. At the death of John Reed, the author of Ten Days
that Shook the World - a first-hand account of the early days of the
Russian Revolution - the copyright of the book passed into the hands of
the British Communist Party, to whom I believe Reed had bequeathed it.
Some years later the British Communists, having destroyed the original
edition of the book as completely as they could, issued a garbled version
from which they had eliminated mentions of Trotsky and also omitted the
introduction written by Lenin. If a radical intelligentsia had still
existed in Britain, this act of forgery would have been exposed and
denounced in every literary paper in the country. As it was there was
little or no protest. To many English intellectuals it seemed quite a
natural thing to, do. And this tolerance or [of?] plain dishonesty means
much more than that admiration for Russia happens to be fashionable
at this moment. Quite possibly that particular fashion will not last. For
all I know, by the time this book is published my view of the Soviet
régime may be the generally-accepted one. But what use would that be in
itself? To exchange one orthodoxy for another is not necessarily an
advance. The enemy is the gramophone mind, whether or not one agrees with
the record that is being played at the moment.
I am well acquainted with all the arguments against freedom of thought and
speech - the arguments which claim that it cannot exist, and the arguments
which claim that it ought not to. I answer simply that they don't convince
me and that our civilization over a period of four hundred years has been
founded on the opposite notice. For quite a decade past I have believed
that the existing Russian régime is a mainly evil thing, and I claim the
right to say so, in spite of the fact that we are allies with the USSR in
a war which I want to see won. If I had to choose a text to justify
myself, I should choose the line from Milton:
By the known rules of ancient liberty.
The word ancient emphasizes the fact that intellectual freedom is a
deep-rooted tradition without which our characteristic western culture
could only doubtfully exist. From that tradition many of our intellectuals
are visibly turning away. They have accepted the principle that a book
should be published or suppressed, praised or damned, not on its merits
but according to political expediency. And others who do not actually hold
this view assent to it from sheer cowardice. An example of this is the
failure of the numerous and vocal English pacifists to raise their voices
against the prevalent worship of Russian militarism. According to those
pacifists, all violence is evil and they have urged us at every stage of
the war to give in or at least to make a compromise peace. But how many of
them have ever suggested that war is also evil when it is waged by the Red
Army? Apparently the Russians have a right to defend themselves, whereas
for us to do [so] is a deadly sin. One can only explain this contradiction
in one way: that is, by a cowardly desire to keep in with the bulk of the
intelligentsia, whose patriotism is directed towards the USSR rather than
towards Britain. I know that the English intelligentsia have plenty of
reason for their timidity and dishonesty, indeed I know by heart the
arguments by which they justify themselves. But at least let us have no
more nonsense about defending liberty against Fascism. If liberty means
anything at all it means the right to tell people what they do not want to
hear. The common people still vaguely subscribe to that doctrine and act
on it. In our country - it is not the same in all countries: it was not so
in republican France, and it is not so in the USA today [i.e. 1945(!)] -
it is the liberals who fear liberty and the intellectuals who want to do
dirt on the intellect: it is to draw attention to that fact that I have
written this preface.
>>>>>>>
______________________________________________________________________________
ifrance.com, l'email gratuit le plus complet de l'Internet !
vos emails depuis un navigateur, en POP3, sur Minitel, sur le WAP...
http://www.ifrance.com/_reloc/email.emailif
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Wed Jan 31 2001 - 15:07:55 MET