How the pioneers came to the west. From a painting by E. F. Hagell.

OPEN FORUM ~

“Good old days’

| JOHN LEE, Pitt Meadows,
7} B.C.: Back in the “good old
‘) days” the workers in Man-

‘} chester had a saying: “Hor-
‘}tocks men work or clem
} (starve); 18 bob for married

men.” (Eighteen bob was about
$4.50 for a 55-60 hour week.)
It is over 60 years since I
became one of the millions of
workers in the mines and fac-
tories of Britain, and the jingle
with which we in Manchester
} greeted the factory bell at 6
} am. came back to me when
reading newspaper accounts of
the Manchester Guardian crit-
icizing the IWA strikers in
B.C.
') I would remind the Man-
'} chester Guardian that, though
} Britain can bury her dead, she
} cannot bury the lives that they
é led, and what a ghastly tale it

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la

} makes. The treatment of the
workers’ children in industry

|) was described by Jack London
‘as the foulest blot in world
history, and I would ask the
Manchester Guardian to keep

} its snoot out of Canadian labor
affairs.

Satire is useful

J. GILCRIST, Vancouver,
}) B.C.: I disagree strongly with
} Don Brown’s comment in a
} letter to the editor in which
he said the “sick” comics are
} ‘rebels without a cause.”
These so-called sick comics
take use of satire to puncture
the egos in society and
‘Satire is a powerful weapon.
Remember Swift and Voltaire
and those lads?

Take Lennie Bruce and his
monologue on used car. deal-
érs, which I quote. as it ap-
peared in a U. S. magazine
article:

“Folks, we gotta lotta nice
cars hyar at Fat Boy’s. Lemme
tell ya bout a used car, friend

pe TO IE

—it’s just like a clock or a
watch—you don’t know what-
cha got til you get it home.
But there’s one thing you can
count on — any car that moves
off the Fat Boy lot has an OK
Sticker on the windshield and,
buddy, when you see an OK
Sticker on a Fat Boy car, you
know one damn thing for sure
—there’s an OK Sticker on
that windshield.

“Now hyar’s some of. the
cars ya’ll be seein’ down hyar.
Nice little Studebaker — this
car was just used once—in a
suicide pact. There’s just a
little lipstick on the exnaust
pipe. Wipe it right off.

“If you like foreign cars,
we gotcha little Fuzzvutten
here — this is a German car
that was just. used a little bit
during the war—taking people
back and forth to the furnace.
The motor’s real good, but the
upholstery is shot. You know,
they’re real stubborn, those
people.” :

These mordant social jabs
are aimed at.a sick society. It
isn’t the comedians who are
“sick”, but the capitalist world
we live in. The “sickniks”’ are
the atomaniacs who want an-
other war; the people in high
places who want to hold the
colonial people down; the bos-
ses who aire -trying to smash
the labor movement, etc.

We need social satire today, |

and so-called sick comedians
like Bruce, .Mort Sahl, Tom
Lehrer, and Shelley Bermdn
are satirists of the first order.
History may well describe
them as rebels with a purpose.

A new reader

HAROLD KEETON, Han-
non, Ontario: Have just read
my first copy of the Pacific
Tribune. I have been a reader
of the Canadian Tribune since

its inception: but find to my
surprise that you people have

a fine paper “out there.”

I liked the article on Tom-
my. Steele, the British rock ’n’
roller, but.must say I consider
the melting of the cold war
poses some problems for the
Socialist world if they are to

be inflicted with “rock” music! .

On automation

READER, Vancouver, B.C.:
I would like to see an article
on automation (or mechaniza-
tion) as it affects the labor
movement; and how they han-
dle the problem in socialist
countries. : :

For example, mechanization
is taking away thousands of
jobs on the waterfront and in
the steél industry in Canada
and the United States. What
are the unions doing about it?

City Mission

DONALD MacRAE sent us
a poem entitled City Mission,
of _which we print. three
sample verses:. :

A shabby building gray ‘with
gloom, : ‘
The jobless men’s resort of

doom.
It stands among the slummy
lanes

A sombre sight—a monument
of shame. :

Each day troubled men visit
the padre

To receive God’s’ word ‘and
handouts gladly,

Some go and beg on the streets
for dimes, :

Some numb their sorrows with
cheap wines.

Now and then the wealthy hur-
ry past— :

O, what a land of terrible con-
trast

Poor men of the mission hun-
gry and needy,

Rich barons of business gross
and greedy.

It is 46 years since Lesya
Ukrainka died on July 19,-
1913. Ukraine’s greatest wo-
man poet. and writer, she was
a true genius and ranks: with
Taras Shevchenko and Ivan
Franko in the literature of her
country. And when. all her
works have been translated
into other languages she will
undoubtedly be regarded as
one of the great women writ-
ers in all world literature.

Lesya Ukrainka was not on-
ly a great revolutionary poet,
she. was also a_ philosepher,
publicist and critic; a political
thinker, humanist and fighter
for justice and freedom. She
was an accomplished linguist
and at 20 knew ail the im-
portant languages of the world,
including English. -

From her early youth she
was a courageous and dedicat-
ed fighter for social and na-
tional freedom of her -people,
enslaved and oppressed by
Czarism and bourgeois nation-
alism.

Her works are imbued with
a passionate love for ordinary
people in their struggles.

She lived in Egypt and Italy
for periods in her short life,
and her prolific works are fill-
ed with episodes depicting the
struggles of these people in
‘bondage. Her writing style can
be compared to Elizabeth Bar-
rett Browning’s works such as
Cry of the Children and Son-
nets from the Portugese. But
her profound thought and
depth of feeling are in-a power-
ful niche all their own.

She died at only 42 years
of age in 1913, just a few
short years before her beloved
Ukraine was to achieve the

Tribute to a great
woman poet,

writer

LESYA UKRAINKA

freedom and happiness she so
desperately wanted for her
people. But her beautiful spirit
in her works shines forth ever
brightly, showing the way to
a just and peaceful world. One
of her greatest works, The
Forests’ Song, recently had its
premiere performance in the
Bolshoi Theatre as a full-length
ballet.

Many schools, universities,

jlibraries, theatres and institu-

tions in the Soviet Union today
bear her name. Her works are
published and read in many
languages in millions of copies.
Her beautiful pen name, “Uk-
rainka’”’ taken by her when
very young in honor of Uk-
raine, is loved and revered by
all progressive Ukrainians and
lovers of freedom everywhere.

MARION PHILIPOVICH |

if I could

touched

had made,

me

levely name!

Lesya Ukrainka

Ah Lesya! How beautiful thy name!

How exquisite thy stature and heart’s flame!
How great thy love for common man

Which made thy deeds yet greater still

And showed thy lovely folk a way

To better life and stronger will!

I’ve never seen the velvet meadows of Ukraine, and

But catch one glimpse ef them, I would
Search every blade of grass for one thee might have

And trace the warm, sweet earth for footsteps thee

And then, I'd bow my head and ask of my own heart q
To beat an extra measure still, just long enough for

To teach my child thy word, thy beauty and thy

MARION PHILIPOVICH.

: ustgetd
August 28, 1959—PACIFIC TRIBUNE—Page 5

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