V. I.

Lenin

83

KRUPSKAYA AND LENIN TO LENIN’S SISTER MARIA

Mlle Marie Ouljanoff, Rue des Minimes, 40, Bruxelles, Belgique

March 17

My greetings will not arrive in time, dear Manya, they will be late, but I nevertheless send you many, many kisses.
Thanks for the views of Brussels, although I do not want to
think of foreign countries too soon, I do not even want to
think about Russia. All I allow myself to think about is
the summer. In her last letter to us, M. Al. wrote that
she is coming to see us this summer with Anyuta, and today
in a letter to Podolsk I plunged into a description of the
charms of
Shusha. [1]

I even outlined a trip to Lake Perovo, where we shall catch crucians and fry them. You see, the
Minusinsk crowd are asking to come to Shusha for the summer, and we are thinking of acquiring a horse, so that it will
be easy to go everywhere. I have become quite a “patriot”
and can talk with great enthusiasm about the Yenisei, the
islands, the forest, etc. All the same I am sorry I am not
a man; I should wander around a lot more. Although I should very much like to see you, I do not intend to tempt
you with Shusha, because, speaking impartially, Shusha is
a village like any other, and if I were asked today to choose
between a place to spend the summer—near Moscow or in
Shusha, I should choose the former.

Volodya is now greatly interested in Kautsky’s
Agrarfrage and is writing a review of it. [2]

So far I can only glance at the book and lick my chops. In general, we have quite
a lot of books and the very abundance of them only makes
one conscious of how much there is to be read and how little
one reads. We are not yet receiving Nachalo , so far only
that boring Russkoye Bogatstvo .

However, I must stop. Mother sends you kisses and congratulations. Volodya intends to write himself.

We received M. Al.’s photo in the last post. It is an excellent likeness, isn’t it?

Many kisses, Yours, Nadya

March 17

I apologise, dear Manyasha, that this time, too, I am writing very little, just adding my congratulations to
Nadya’s. The fact is that today a lot of letters have to be
written—to Turukhansk (the post goes once a month), [3]
and then I have to send Anyuta a list of the misprints in
the clean proofs she sent me.

We have very little news. There is a lull in literary activity—we keep waiting. Foreign newspapers write of events
in St. Petersburg and Finland (judging by Frankfurter Zeitung ) but what they write is inked over, so we know
very, very little. [4]

All the best. Perhaps au revoir ?

Yours,

V. U.

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Notes:
[1]
The letter has been lost.— Ed .

[2]