Travel Broadens

The seven Soviet intellectuals who journeyed to Manhattan last month for the Communist-inspired "peace conference" at the Waldorf-Astoria were safely home again. In Moscow's Literary Gazette, Russian Movie Director Sergei Gerasimov unpacked some of his impressions of the trip.

Manhattan's skyline, he wrote, consisted of "high skyscrapers and the glitter of electric advertising . . . intended to daze the unprepared visitor and muddle his ideas." Manhattan's culture provided "pseudoscientific pamphlets decorated with a standard cover: a painted man indecently kissing a woman." Even the kids were corrupt. "Steel handcuffs for small children," he reported, "attracted our attention in a toyshop . . ."

Even more shocking manifestations of capitalist decadence lingered in Traveler Gerasimov's memory. "The naked woman's body, like a national trademark," wrote Gerasimov, "has become the symbol of American commerce. Naked, seminaked, undressing and dressing women fill not only the films but the pages of magazines advertising food, clothing, automobiles, hotels, refrigerators, chewing gum and everything which in the opinion of the businessman would represent the vital interests of the people. The indecency of American advertising is indescribable."

The only good things Gerasimov found during his visit to the U.S. were "the clever, honest and educated Americans we met at the conference." But these, alas, doubtless victimized by the lure of lingerie, were "all characterized by one trait: a bitter, ironical smile."

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