MEET ME ON THE BARRICADES

DARRELL Avdeyenko, one of Stalin’s novelists. In 193 5 at. . . . The Seventh World Congress of the Communist International at Mos- cow. The hall is filled to capacity with delegates from all the civilized countries of the ‘world. The inter- national revolutionary general stafi‘ is here assembled. The novelist AVDEYENKO mounts the platform AVDEYENKO No beating around the bush for him Centuries shall elapse and the communist gen- , erations of the future will deem us the happiest mortals who have inhabited this planet through the ages, because it is we who have seen Stalin, the leader-genius, Stalin, the sage, the smiling, the kindly, the supremely simple. . . . ASCAS0 ' It’s unbelievable! DARRELL Wait! The cream of the jest is yet to come. AVDEYENKO His face bathed in ecstasy When I met Stalin, even at a distance, I

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