Building by Isaiah Berlin

Author:Isaiah Berlin
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House

TO MCGEORGE BUNDY

17 June 1968

Wolfson

Dear Mac,

Thank you very much for your letter of 4 June. Its contents are most welcome. To hold the Ford shares for at least two years would suit us very well. We shall probably hold them for longer, in fact. I see that your letter was written on the very day on which I went through my peculiar ordeal at Columbia – all in desperate search for a doctorate which I was unable to achieve by my own efforts […].

It was all dreadfully expunged by the news of the next day. I heard Arthur make a commencement address at his and my university and saw him later – his life seemed to me (I hope temporarily) totally in pieces. I only hope that the great wave of self-incrimination, which is natural enough, won’t lead to the emergence of some terrible father figure, who will promise to set everything right. The effect in England was very violent indeed, and provoked scarcely any criticism of the United States, but genuine fellow-feeling. There is really no doubt about the special relationship, for proclaiming which I was once publicly denounced by the late Lord Beaverbrook. ‹I often wondered whether it was genuine. Funnily enough, it is.›

If you are coming to England towards the end of this month, do communicate, although if you do not I shall not hold it against you, but I do see that over-developed countries have moral and social problems, as well as economic ones, which no one ever predicted. Rather like the Roman Empire at the beginning of the fourth century ad – but there: I don’t propose to try to emulate either Joe or Prof. Toynbeefn159 – if I had to choose between them, I would still rather be the former. And so, I am sure, would you.

Yours ever,

‹Isaiah (earned M.A.)›

TO YEHUDI MENUHIN

18 June 1968

Wolfson

Dearest Cousin,fn160

I am not surprised by the letter which you have kindly forwarded to me. I, too, have had messages from S. F. Vogel,fn161 and have shamefully ducked all his requests. I do not know what one owes to one’s ancestors: I have warm feelings towards these now so strange-looking men, but when I went to New York some years ago and visited the ‘Centre’, presided over by our cousin Menachem M.,fn162 I went in heavy disguise and preserved my anonymity for fear of being discovered. I had had some correspondence with the present leader’s father when I was a schoolboy, but this left no profound impression upon me, I fear. I see absolutely no reason why you should (you surely have no kind of obligation to) play like Davidfn163 before them, especially gratis. You could send them a message if you wished, and so, perhaps, could I, and it would be delightful to send a joint message, but that’s about it. Holy men they may be, but barbarous to some extent also: and despite the patronage of my own patron, Saint Isaac, I propose to keep away – there is

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