April 15 Sunday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam replied with an aphorism to Carolyn Wells: “It is easier for a needle to go through a camel’s eye than for a rich woman to sprain her ancle & keep it out of the papers. / Truly Yours / Mark Twain / April 15, 1906 / With greetings & good wishes to Carolyn Wells” [MTP].
The New York Times ran a front-page scandal story involving Maxim Gorky; Mark Twain’s remarks on helping Russia were included:
GORKY AND ACTRESS ASKED TO QUIT HOTELS
She Is Not Mme. Gorky, Though He Calls Her So.
REAL MME. GORKY IN RUSSIA
Writer’s Companion is Mme. Andreieva, a Russian Actress—He Says She’s His Wife in His Eyes.
——— ——— ——— ———
The manager of the Hotel Belleclaire, where Maxim Gorky and the woman who has been generally known here as Mme. Gorky, have been staying as guests of H. Gaylord Wilshire, discovered yesterday from a published story what has been no secret since their arrival—that is, that the so-called Mme. Gorky is not the wife of the revolutionary leader, but Mme. Andreieva, a Russian actress. As a result, both were compelled to leave the hotel. They moved to the Lafayette-Brevoort, at Fifth Avenue and Eighth Street. Late yesterday they left this hotel also, going to apartments at 12 Fifth Avenue. At the Lafayette-Brevoort it was said that they had departed of their own accord.
[more details of the controversy are cut here]
MARK TWAIN’S POSITION.
We Took France’s Aid, and Should Help Russians, He Holds.
Much adverse criticism has arisen here through the formation of the committee to purchase arms to aid Maxim Gorky in his revolutionary movement. Many prominent men are on the committee. Mark Twain, one of the members, was questioned on the matter yesterday at his Fifth Avenue home.
“Why,” he was asked, “should this country assist in any way the Russian people in their revolutionary movement?”
“Because we were quite willing,” he replied, “to accept France’s assistance when we were in the throes of our Revolution, and we have always been grateful for that assistance. It is our turn now to pay that debt of gratitude by helping another oppressed people in its struggle for liberty, and we must either do it or confess that our gratitude to France was only eloquent words, with no sincerity back of them.”
“But do you think it consistent that Americans, with their so-called love of peace, should aid in a movement to throw Russia into a bloody revolution, particularly in view of the fact that America was chiefly instrumental in bringing to an end the Russo-Japanese war?” To this Mr. Twain replied:
“Inasmuch as we conducted our own Revolution with guns and the sword, our mouths are closed against preaching gentler methods to other oppressed nations. Revolutions are achieved by blood and courage alone. So far as I know there has been but one revolution which was carried to a successful issue without bloodshed.”
“In lending, then, our assistance to the Russian people for the overthrow of their despotic form of government, why should we not also start active propaganda seeking the abolition of all similar forms of government?”
“Simply because,” replied Mr. Clemens, “we have not been invited to do it. Should the invitation come, as in the present case, we will put our shoulder to the wheel.” [See Schmidt for full article.]
Susan Crane wrote from Quarry Farm, Elmira to ask Sam for autographs for two young cousins of her late husband, Theodore Crane. The mother of the children would be in NY. “…I think how Livy would rejoice in all you are doing to help every body, and—possibly with her mighty, inspiring love she is undergirding you in these very activities—Sometimes it seems that she is not far away and helps…” [MTP].
April 15 after – Sam wrote “The Gorky Incident” sometime after Gorky was evicted from his hotel on Apr. 15, 1906; it was not published in Sam’s lifetime. It first appeared edited by Bernard DeVoto in Slavonic and East European Review (Aug. 1944), p. 37-8; it was again revised and published in Letters from the Earth (1962), which Budd gives as the more accurate TS [Budd, Collected 2: 1011].
Frank E. Vaughn wrote from NYC to Sam. In a melodramatic letter, Vaughn contrasted Gorky’s welcome with “shrieks of ‘Crucify Him’” and closed with “Hands off and give Maxim Gorky a chance!” [MTP].