V. I.

Lenin

256

To:   THE PRESIDIUM OF THE PETROGRAD SOVIET [1]

Dear Comrades, In my opinion, to provide scientists with an extra room
for a study, and for a laboratory, in Petrograd (a city
exceptionally well off as regards apartments) is really and
truly no sin. You should even have taken the initiative
yourselves.

I strongly request you to get this thing moving and, if you disagree with me, to be kind enough to drop me a
few words immediately, so that I see where the obstacle is.

With communist greetings,
V. Ulyanov (Lenin )

October 21

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Notes:
[1]
This letter was written in response to Maxim Gorky’s appeal to the
All-Russia Commission for Improving Scientists’ Living Conditions, in which he mentioned certain cases when scientific workers had
been obliged to share too large a part of their flats with new tenants.
Gorky was then chairman of the Petrograd branch of the
Commission.