Paul Robeson

by Martin Duberman

  Katzenstein also told Sam Rosen that PR had Paget’s. Seeming to confirm that such a diagnosis was made, Peggy Middleton wrote Cedric Belfrage, “As I always, admittedly only intuitively, insisted, it has turned out to be a physical defect,” adding, “the prognosis is not good. I suppose he could live quite a while, but he is a shadow of the man he was, both physically and mentally, or perhaps I should say spiritually, because he is quite sane, but so tired mentally that sustained conversation is difficult for him.” Middleton relayed the gist of a phone call she had had the day before with Harry Francis in which “we both said to each other how we wished we had been more successful earlier … to have saved Paul the 58 [four more than the 54 listed by Ackner] shock treatments and all the unnecessary medication”; but Essie had been entirely in control, and neither Peggy, who had questioned the treatment, nor Harry, who apparently had not, had had any real influence over her (Middleton to Belfrage, “Christmas ’63,” courtesy of Belfrage). Dr. Perlmutter’s notes provide additional confirmation of the diagnosis of Paget’s disease; when admitting PR to Gracie Square Hospital in June 1965, Perlmutter wrote on his chart: “… also has Paget’s disease of the skull” (Gracie Square Hospital records, courtesy of PR, Jr.).

  51. ER to the Huntons, Oct. 5, 1963; ER to Shirley Du Bois, Oct. 5, 1963; ER to Freda Diamond, Nov. 5, 1963; ER to Colin Sweet, Nov. 15, 1963; ER to family, Nov. 18, 1963—all in RA; ER to family, Nov. 16, 21, 1963, courtesy of Paulina Forsythe. Harry Francis also told me that Dr. Katzenstein had said PR would have to live quietly (untaped interview, Aug. 30, 1982). Neues Deutschland, Sept. 7, 1963 (Zetkin “peace” medal).

  According to Dr. Katzenstein, Essie had earlier sensed that her illness was terminal, and the feeling was confirmed when the Buch clinicians decided not to operate on her. According to Ursula (Mrs.) Katzenstein, Paul “wasn’t concerned with Essie’s problems”; he didn’t want to believe she was seriously ill, because “his physical well-being depended on her.” Essie wrote in a similar vein to the family: “First, he was a bit scared when I went down, but fortunately he missed the worst part.… After that I was able to maintain a cheerful front while he was in my room.… By the time he was disarmed and relieved, I began really to feel better.… What is really encouraging, he began to wait on me.… All very new for him. And he seemed to really take an interest, and enjoy being useful, without any reminder. It was sweet, and quite a departure” (ER to family, Sept. 23, 1963, courtesy of Paulina Forsythe). The Katzensteins were amazed when one day Essie casually took out the breast prosthesis she’d recently gotten and showed it off to them, delighting in how good it looked and how well it was made (interview with the Katzensteins, July 26, 1986).

  While in the GDR, Essie also stayed busy with writing and putting in occasional public appearances. One especially notable one was a seminar on “The Negro and the USA” that she led at Humboldt University. Taking advantage of the presence in East Berlin of Helen and Scott Nearing, Kay Cole (wife of Lester Cole, the blacklisted writer, and herself active in Women Strike for Peace), Rev. Stephen Fritchman, and Earl Dickerson, she formed a panel that ran for nearly three hours and was apparently a great success (“… Scott got up and delivered a BLAST about the oligarchy of money and power and the takeover by Fascism of everything, including the means of communication, Etc!!! Boy, Oh Boy, he just stood up and blasted, with no introduction, no anything, militant, fighting, terrific” [ER to family, Dec. 5, 1963, RA]) (interview with Earl Dickerson, July 2, 1986).

  52. Interviews with Katzenstein (July 26, 1986) and Diana Loesser (July 29, 1986); ER to family, Nov. 18, 1963, RA; ER to family, Oct. 27, Nov. 2, 16, 21, 26, Dec. 1, 1963, courtesy of Paulina Forsythe. He also had a brief phone interview with Sovietskaya Rossiya (April 31, 1963). Back in 1954 PR had recorded a song for Joris Ivens’s film The Song of the Rivers, with a score by Shostakovich, lyrics by Bertolt Brecht, screenplay and commentary by Vladimir Pozner (Pozner to PR, July 22, 1954; PR to Pozner, telegram, July 27, 1954, NYPL/Schm: PR).

  53. Interviews with Kay Pankey, July 26, 1986, and Ollie Harrington, July 29, 1986; PR to Aubrey Pankey, May 24, 1963; ER to Pankeys, Nov. 6, 30, 1963—courtesy of Kay Pankey. For more on PR and the Pankeys, see pp. 358, 426. Dr. Katzenstein confirms that, although PR talked little, he “understood fully” (interview, July 26, 1986).

  54. ER to family, Nov. 18, 1963, RA; ER to family, Nov. 16, 21, 1963, courtesy of Paulina Forsythe.

  55. PR to Ben Robeson, Nov. 10, 1963, courtesy of Paulina Forsythe; interview with Dr. Katzenstein, July 26, 1986; ER to family, Nov. 18, 1963, RA; ER to family, Nov. 16, 21, 1963, courtesy of Paulina Forsythe. Paul and Essie had watched the March on Washington on television (ER to George Murphy, Jr., Oct. 4, 1963, MSRC: Murphy).

  56. ER to family, Nov. 18, 1963, RA. Essie strongly implied that letters seconding the opinion of the doctors were needed from family and friends. Responding to ER’s query whether Paul would be “accepted” back in the States, George Murphy, Jr., suggested he could profitably busy himself in two ways: working to establish a repertory theater in Harlem and helping to set up a Du Bois Foundation (Murphy to ER, Dec. 7, 1963, RA). Katzenstein advised him against making public appearances but, recognizing Paul’s need to feel useful, suggested he “might be visited for strategy and advice” (interview with Katzenstein, July 26, 1986).

  57. ER to family, Dec. 5, 7, 13, 1963, RA; interview with Katzenstein, July 26, 1986. On Dec. 15, two days before the Robesons left the GDR, the Katzensteins had them to dinner to celebrate Essie’s birthday. In their guest book that night, Robeson wrote, “… And thanks so much for taking me into your lovely family—integrating me, so to speak.…” At the bottom of the page he added, “Thanks so much. Grateful remembrances. All best possible” (guest book courtesy of Katzensteins). Even while at the Priory, Robeson had sometimes talked about wanting to go home (ER to Rosens, May 17, 1963, courtesy of Helen Rosen), and had once appended a note to one of Essie’s letters to Helen: “I’m terribly lonely and miss home” (ER to Helen Rosen, May 31, 1963, courtesy of Rosen).

  CHAPTER 25 ATTEMPTED RENEWAL (1964–1965)

  1. New York Post, New York Daily News, The New York Times, all Dec. 23, 1963. The New York Herald Tribune characterized Essie as a “hovering shield” (Dec. 23, 1963), and described PR as suf fering “a physical breakdown” as the result of “a severe circulatory condition” (Dec. 20, 1963).

  2. New York Amsterdam News, Jan. 4, 1964; Post, News, and Times—all Dec. 23, 1963; F. G. Dutton to Mailliard, Jan. 23, 1964, RA; FBI Main 100-12304-674, 691 (press); FBI New York 100-25857-4453.

  3. New York Herald Tribune, Dec. 25, 1963. The Journal-American made similar remarks.

  4. Paul Jarrico letter in Herald Tribune, Paris ed., Dec. 28, 1963; Pittsburgh Courier, Jan. 11, 1964 (J. A. Rogers); Joseph North in The Worker, Jan. 5, 1964, also protested the Trib editorial; ER to Davison, Sept. 7, 1964, RA. The ms. of a brief tribute to Du Bois, dated Aug. 29 (which the Robesons sent Shirley Du Bois), is in RA.

  5. Interview with Perlmutter, March 7, 1983; Perlmutter to Ackner, June 15, 1964 (drugs), and nearly identical letter to Dr. Baumann at the Buch Clinic, same date, RA. Requests for interviews are in William Longgood to PR, Jan. 7, 8, 1964; Allan Morrison (Johnson Publishing) to PR, Sept. 8, 1964; Bob Lucas to PR, June 14, 1964 (saying Life was interested)—all in RA. He also got an invitation from the Student Council at Rutgers to speak (Leo Ribuffo to PR, Feb. 3, 1964, RA).

  6. ER to George Murphy, Jr., Jan. 31, May 31, 1964, MSRC: Murphy; Multiple interviews with Freda Diamond. Rockmore had made money for PR in the stock market and had assured him, “your finances are in such a condition that if you decided to take it easy … you can get by without too much effort” (Rockmore to PR, Sept. 22, 1961, RA). Multiple interviews with Marilyn Robeson; ER to “Joe and Mary” North, March 5, 1964; ER to Loessers, Sept. 6, 1964, PR Archiv, GDR. Helen Rosen and Marilyn Robeson had spent a week, along with two cleaning men, scouring the Jumel house; unoccupied for years, it had been filthy.
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  7. ER to George Murphy, Jr., March 4, 1964, RA. Murphy had had dinner with the Robesons soon after their return and wrote his brother Carl, publisher of The Afro-American, “Carl, Paul is a sick man!” and suggested that an interview in The Afro-American, whenever Paul felt able, might help to perk him up (GM, Jr., to CM, Dec. 31, 1963; GM, Jr., to ER, Jan. 18, 1964, MSRC: Murphy). Essie’s tribute to Du Bois was printed in the San Francisco Sun Reporter, March 7, 1964, and favorably commented on in the press (Philadelphia Afro-American, March 7, 1964) and by friends (Herbert Bibertnan to Robesons, Feb. 24, 1964, RA). The FBI also monitored the Du Bois event (FBI New York 100-25857-4531).

  8. ER to George Murphy, Jr., May 21, June 2, 1964 (baseball), MSRC: Murphy; ER to Ben Davis, Jr., March 7, 1964, courtesy of Nina Goodman (Mrs. Ben Davis, Jr.); Aptheker to ER, April 21, 25, 1964, RA; National Guardian, March 28, 1964; ER to Claude Barnett. June 1, 1964, CHS: Barnett (Marian). When the British Peace Committee, through Harry Francis, arranged a concert in honor of Paul, and The Worker celebrated its anniversary, Essie wrote out messages of greetings for Paul to sign (Harry Francis to ER, Jan. 20, Feb. 12, 18, 28, March 26, 1964, RA; the messages are in RA). At the Guardian luncheon Essie had strong praise for the current civil-rights struggle, a theme she often sounded in her articles, particularly in “Long Hot Summer” and “Dialogue Between White and Black Americans at the Town Hall” (typed mss. in RA). She was sympathetic to the radical wing of the movement and defended Malcolm X for talking about the need for self-defense (“What could be more reasonable?” she wrote Carlton Goodlett [April 1, 1964, RA], “What with all the dogs, and bombs, and dynamite around!”). During the four months at the Buch Clinic, Essie had also completed a new book, tentatively entitled Determined to Be an American, but it was turned down by U.S. publishers (Walter Bradbury, Harper & Row, to ER, April 14, 1964, RA). In July, Essie went to London to cover the Commonwealth meetings; her articles on them are in RA. After seeing Josephine Baker’s show one night, Essie went backstage for a chat. “Surrounded by practically all of New York, when she heard my name she left everybody, backed me into a corner and said: My Dear, how is our Paul? Bless her. I gave her our phone number and address and she was on the telephone bright and early.… She talked with Paul.… [He] was VERY pleased and touched” (ER to Goodlett, May 1, 1964, RA). All the doctors Perlmutter contacted responded with pleasure to the news of Robeson’s improvement: copies of letters from Drs. Snezhnevsky, Ackner, and Katzenstein are in RA; Dr. Baumann wrote the Robesons, “It also gives me pleasure to hear that Paul is doing quite well again and that the process of healing that we set under way here has made continual progress since then” (Sept. 18, 1964, RA, translated from the German by Michael Lipson).

  9. A copy of Perlmutter’s medical records is in RA; interview with Perlmutter, March 7, 1983. ER to George Murphy, Jr., March 4, 1964 (“feels he isn’t”); ER to Bass, May 24, 1964 (limited energy); ER to Kotov, June 14, 1964 (idleness); ER to “Dear Dear Friend,” Sept. 19, 1964 (reduced medication)—all in RA; ER to Rosens, April 10, 1964, courtesy Rosen.

  10. An account of PR’s appearance at the Davis funeral is in The Worker, Sept. 1, 1964. Elizabeth Gurley Flynn had also recently died; though she and Robeson were not close, shortly before her death she had written an admiring column about him (The Worker, April 19, 1964) and he in turn sent a message on the occasion of a memorial tribute to her (Grace Hutchins to PR, Sept. 30, 1964, RA). New York Amsterdam News, Sept. 5, 1964 (scene at funeral); the typescript of PR’s brief eulogy is in RA.

  11. The typed ms. of PR’s statement to the black press (dated Aug. 28, 1964) is in RA. Several black papers reprinted the statement, including the Sun-Reporter, the New York Amsterdam News, and The Afro-American (both on Sept. 5, 1964). Essie had wanted to hold a press conference exclusively for the black press, with the socialist press and maybe “a Tass man” included, but Paul decided on issuing a statement instead (ER to family, Sept. 23, 1963, courtesy of Paulina Forsythe).

  12. Rinzler to PR, June 23, Nov. 16, 1964; Rinzler to ER, April 27, June 3, 1965; ER to Rinzler, May 5, 1965; ER to “Dear Dear Friend,” Sept. 19, 1964; ER to Harold Davison, Sept. 7, 1964—all in RA; phone interview with Alan Rinzler, May 5, 1986; interview with Earl Robinson, Aug. 17, 1986.

  13. ER to George Murphy, Jr. (appended to copy of ER to Clifford McKay, Nov. 16, 1964), MSRC: Murphy. Copy of Perlmutter’s medical notes on PR in RA, as is the typescript of PR’s Carnegie Hall remarks; Richard Morford (executive director of American-Soviet Friendship), Nov. 6, 24, 1964; Joe North to PR, Oct. 8, 1964; Joe North to ER, Oct. 8, 1964 (Lawson); The Worker, Nov. 16 (Carnegie), 22 (Lawson), 1964; Lawson to Robesons, Nov. 29, 1964: ER to Kotov, Nov. 22, 1964—all in RA. Predictably, the FBI was also present at the Carnegie Hall event (FBI New York 100-25857-4608).

  14. Copy of Perlmutter’s medical notes on PR are in RA; ER to Kotov, Nov. 22, 1964, RA (“exhausted”);John Henrik Clarke (associate editor of Freedomways) to PR, Oct. 6, 1964, RA. The seven-page typescript of PR’s article on Du Bois—by far the most extensive writing he had attempted in some time—is in RA. Esther Jackson to PR, March 25, 1965, RA; New York Amsterdam Nevis, April 10, 1965 (ovation). In PR’s own hand is the brief statement he wrote for American Dialog, the replacement for Mainstream (which had folded in Aug. 1963), edited by his friend Joseph North; in the statement Robeson hailed “the gallant new chapter in American history” written by the recent Selma-to-Montgomery March (American Dialog, May-June 1965). Yet another death in this period was that of Lil Landau, a close associate of Vito Marcantonio’s and friendly with the Robesons since Progressive Party days; the ms. of ER’s brief tribute to her, dated March 6, 1965, is in RA.

  15. The arrangements for Claudia Jones’s funeral produced some incidental friction. Her associate, A. Manchanda (“Manu”), publicly announced that Robeson had agreed to serve as honorary chairman of the memorial committee, when in fact he had not. Harry Francis was indignant about Manchanda’s role (Francis to Robesons, Jan. 18, 1965; Francis to Manchanda, Jan. 17, 1965; “Manu” to Robesons, Jan. 20, 1965 [misdated 1964]—all in RA, along with a transcript of PR’s tape recording). On the Hansberry funeral: The New York Times, New York Herald Tribune, both Jan. 17, 1965, plus PR’s brief eulogy, partly written in his hand, RA. ER had put Hansberry’s mother in touch with Hubert Delany for legal advice and had visited Lorraine in the hospital twice during her last days (ER to George Murphy, Jr., Dec. 24, 1964, MSRC: Murphy. PR in early 1965 also put in a surprise appearance at the Jan. 15 Statler-Hilton dinner to mark the double celebration of Alexander Trachtenberg’s eightieth birthday and the fortieth anniversary of International Publishers, which he had founded (National Guardian, Jan. 23, 1965; James S. Allen [president of International Publishers] to PR, Jan. 6, 18, 1965; ms. of PR’s tribute, partly in his hand—all RA). The FBI also attended (FBI New York 100-25857-4635). Several weeks later PR spoke briefly at a party to raise money for the Upper West Side W. E. B. Du Bois Club, a Marxist youth group of the New Left (Frieder to PR, Feb. 6, March 1, 1965, RA).

  16. Conversations with PR, Jr. Malcolm X’s comment on Robeson is quoted in The Afro-American, Nov. 30, 1963; the occasion was an attack Malcolm was making on Jackie Robinson for having criticized the Muslims, during which he alluded to Robinson’s earlier assault on Robeson. Essie wrote a sympathetic account of Malcolm X’s funeral (The Afro-American, March 16, 1965), though it’s possible to read hostility toward the Muslims in general in a cryptic comment she makes about them in a letter to Henry Winston (Dec. 12, 1964, RA); moreover, she had earlier written the Rosens that she found Muslim influence in the United States “very frightening.… Brother, it’s bad enough with the Arabs!!” (ER to Rosens, May 6, 1963, courtesy of Helen Rosen.) RA contains the typescript of an interview with PR by Jack O’Dell and Esther Jackson, editors of Freedomways, in which Robeson is described as having “great respect” for the Muslims’ “emphasis on the development of economic power among Negroes, discipline, responsibility and pride.” But ac
cording to PR, Jr., who was present at the interview, the editors of Freedomways added so much extraneous material that, in consultation with his father, PR, Jr., denied permission for the interview to be published.

  There are several other versions (besides PR, Jr.’s) of the Muslims’ approach to Robeson. According to an article in the Amsterdam News (May 1, 1965) reporting the Freedomways salute to Robeson on April 22, Ossie Davis recalled in front of the audience that Malcolm X “had asked him after Miss Hansberry’s funeral to help arrange a meeting with Mr. Robeson whom Malcolm had come to admire.” Davis repeated the same version in his interview with Sterner. According to Chuck Moseley and Homer Sadler, Robeson’s bodyguards during his May-June 1965 trip to California, a delegation from the Muslims came to them with greetings from Elijah Muhammad as well as an invitation to meet (interview with Moseley and Sadler [PR, Jr., participating], May 3, 1982).

  17. Davis/Baldwin/Killens to Jessica Smith, March 3, 1965, MSRC: Smith Papers; Young to Ossie Davis, April 6, 1965; Lawson to Freedomways, April 7, 1965; Wilkins to Davis, April 8, 1965; Susskind to Freedomways, April 2, 1965—all in RA.

  18. The program for the Americana Hotel salute is in RA. The fullest accounts of the event are in The Worker, May 2, 1965; the Amsterdam News, May 1, 1965 (audience four-fifths white); and Charles P. Howard in the Washington Afro-American, May 8, 1965. Among the transcribed speeches and greetings in RA is a letter hailing Robeson’s “enormous courage and his complete devotion to his fellowmen” signed by fifty members of the House of Commons (Julius Silverman, the organizer, to PR, April 3, 1965), as well as congratulatory messages from Compton MacKenzie, Benjamin Britten, Stefan Heym, Cedric Belfrage, Konstantin Simonov—and PR’s Somerville classmate Hazel Ericson (Dodge). Rev. Walter Fauntroy, at his June 4, 1965, commencement address at Howard University, praised Robeson as a “cultural giant,” though declaring, “He holds political views that are unpalatable to all of us” (the address was sent by Elizabeth Cardozo to ER, July 10, 1965, RA). In the seven hundred tapes and transcripts about the civil-rights movement at Howard University, there is not a single mention of Robeson—a devastating gauge of the generation gap. James Farmer records being taken to meet Robeson at his home in 1965, and inviting him to attend some CORE rallies. When he didn’t, Farmer checked back and asked why: “Jim,” Robeson purportedly said, “I felt that you had enough problems without being embarrassed by my presence” (James Farmer, Lay Bare the Heart [Arbor House, 1985], p. 297).