Russell’s Speech at the London School of Economics in 1965: A Note on a Partial Film Record

Abstract

February 19, 2011 (11:48 am) E:\CPBR\RUSSJOUR\TYPE3002\russell 30,2 040 red.wpd 1 I. Grattan-Guinness, “Bertrand Russell (1872–1970), Man of Dissent”, Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London 63 (2009): 365–79. 2 The Wlm came from the Associated Press News, and is available on the Internet at http://www.russellsocietylibrary.com/lse.html.Another Wlm,lastingaboutthreeminutes, is available for a huge fee from Independent Television News (http://www.itnsource. com/shotlist//RTV/1965/02/15/BGY505220323). russell: the Journal of Bertrand Russell Studies n.s. 30 (winter 2010–11): 143–7 The Bertrand Russell Research Centre, McMaster U. issn 0036-01631; online 1913-8032 iscussion RUSSELL’S SPEECH AT THE LONDON SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS IN 1965: A NOTE ON A PARTIAL FILM RECORD I. Grattan-Guinness Middlesex U. Business School The Burroughs, Hendon, London nw4 4bt, uk ivor2@mdx.ac.uk In an article recently published by the Royal Society of London I reviewed some aspects of Russell’s anti-war activities.1 The initial context was a speech that he gave in the Old Theatre in the Old Building of the London School of Economics in February 1965 to a student organization called “The lse Labour Society”, which I heard, in which he attacked the British government for its support of the American war in Vietnam. He published it in 1969 in the third volume of his autobiography (Auto. 3: 205–15). In a footnote to that article I noted that Kenneth Blackwell had advised me that a rather dim Wlm-shot (Wgure 1; hereafter, “fs”) existed (not in the Russell Archives) of Russell addressing the lse Labour Society, and that he took it to show the February 1965 speech. However, I demurred, for various reasons; and, recalling that Russell had spoken to the Society four years previously, in February 1961, I proposed that this must be the occasion recorded in fs; apparently no Wle survives concerning it. But this guess has been falsiWed by a source on the Internet that has recently come to light thanks to the librarian of the Bertrand Russell Society. It is about Wve minutes of short sections of moving Wlm,2 showing Russell delivering a speech to the lse Labour Society, and also the arrival of some of the audience; February 19, 2011 (11:48 am) E:\CPBR\RUSSJOUR\TYPE3002\russell 30,2 040 red.wpd 144 i. grattan-guinness Figure 1. A still from the Wlm. February 19, 2011 (11:48 am) E:\CPBR\RUSSJOUR\TYPE3002\russell 30,2 040 red.wpd Russell’s Speech at LSE in 1965 145 Figure 2. The Manchester Guardian photograph, published 16 Feb. 1965, p. 1. February 19, 2011 (11:48 am) E:\CPBR\RUSSJOUR\TYPE3002\russell 30,2 040 red.wpd 146 i. grattan-guinness 3 Edith Russell, “z‘Clark’s Fatuous Book’ (Part 3)”, Russell, this issue, p. 136; text kindly supplied by the Editor. fs has deWnitely been taken from it, as some frame between 50 and 60 seconds in. Further, the Wlm carries a soundtrack of quality just suUcient to reveal that Russell was reading out parts of the prefatory “emergency statement” about the fears of imminent war and early passages of the 1965 speech: they are published on pages 205–6 of his autobiography. So this Wlm complements a close-up photograph of Russell delivering the speech that the Manchester Guardianz published the next day (Wgure 2; hereafter, “mg”), which I had included in my article. The Wlm also corrects my description of the other Wgures that I gave in my footnote. Russell was standing behind a table with his wife Edith at its end to his left, his secretary Christopher Farley between the two of them, and with Ralph Schoenman seated at his immediate right; by the time mg was taken, for some reason Schoenman had moved away. In my article I recalled the hostile reception that the speech received: that surely Russell had not written it, and that the anti-American position taken in it was so extreme. For us in the audience part of the disappointment was due to his frequent inaudibility, caused by his poor technique with the...