"Gawky Gorky"

Russian Bolsheviki are peeved with Maxim Gorky, famed Russian author, who now lives in Berlin. Once Gorky opposed the Bolsheviki; then he admired them, and became one himself. Later he got disgusted, and by a trick managed to leave Russia. Biased Bolsheviki think he is a gawk; hence the expression, "Gawky Gorky." Of course, Maxim Gorky is neither awkward nor stupid, as War Lord Leon Trotsky pointed out in an inflammable speech:

"Gorky is indisputably one of the greatest contemporary Russian authors. Unfortunately, however, he does not comprehend the Russian revolutionary movement.

"I will not allude to his attitude toward the Russian working classes, but his attitude toward the Russian peasant is for us an interesting psychological problem which needs to be studied. Maxim Gorky warns us thus: 'Leaders of the Bolshevists, remember my words! The day is not distant when the Russian peasants will revolt against your terrorism, and then, woe unto you! They will ruthlessly "unscrew" your heads!'

"This is expressed in a most picturesque manner, but Gorky forgets that, should the Russian peasant rise against the Bolshevist government and a peasant revolution, indeed, break out, the heads, not only of the best part of the Russian intellectuals, but also those of the working classes, will be 'unscrewed.'

"Maxim Gorky understood how to throw dust in the eyes of our government by writing excellent eulogies of Lenin, and was allowed to go abroad. But no sooner had he crossed the Russian frontier than he tore off his mask and showed himself in his true colors. He is now inflaming the Russian peasants and stirring them up to revolt against the Bolshevist government--an activity which cannot be too strongly condemned."