Soviet Russia Now

Abstract

Just now it is a beautiful moment in Soviet Russia. Clear sunny day follows clear sunny day. The fields are gorgeous with hundreds of varieties of wild-flowers. Wherever you go by train every inch of the rich country seems to be planted. From bankrupt, speculator-ridden Estonia, where the fields lie unplowed and the factory chimneys stand smokeless, where the ragged people run beside the train begging, to cross the frontier into Soviet Russia seems like entering a rich, well-ordered land. Everywhere the green crops are growing, occasionally a wood-burning factory sends up smoke; but more significant is the look of the people — none well-dressed, but none in rags, none overfed, but none who look as if they were suffering. And the children! This is a country for children, primarily. In every city, in every village, the children have their own public dining-rooms, where the food is better, and there is more of it, than for the grown-ups. Only the Red Army is fed so well. The children pay nothing for their food; they are clothed free of charge by the cities; for them are the schools, the children’s colonies — land-owners’ mansions scattered over the face of Russia; for them are the theaters and concerts — the immense, gorgeous State theaters crowded with children from orchestra to gallery. In their honor Tsarkoe Selo — the Tsar’s Village, the village of palaces — has been rechristened Detskoe Selo, the Children’s Village; a hundred thousand of them spend the summer there, in relays. The streets are full of happy children.