My Several Worlds (60 page)

Nevertheless, the atmosphere oppressed me and I could not enjoy my visit. When an invitation came to me to visit Germany I refused it, and the next day in the Copenhagen newspaper I saw the following report:

“Pearl Buck says, ‘I do not wish to visit a country where I am not allowed to think and speak freely.’

“‘Wouldn’t you like to visit Germany?’ we asked.

“‘Yes,’ she replied, ‘in one way I should like to see how the Germans live now but I think they would not welcome me there. And I don’t want to visit a country where I am not allowed to think and speak freely as I am doing here. I am an individualist and a democrat.’

“Pearl S. Buck has said this in a low and gentle voice, but nevertheless we understand that it has been very important for her to mention it here in Copenhagen.”

In Copenhagen I was much depressed, too, by talk with Chinese friends, who, though themselves Nationalists and loyal to Chiang Kai-shek, were nevertheless alarmed at the growing weaknesses of his government. I answered the inevitable questions of newspaper reporters as honestly as I could in the light of my own information. At such a time of crisis in the world, it would be wrong, I felt, to be less honest than I could be. Therefore when asked about China, I said that I did not see peace there for many years to come—yes, perhaps not real peace for as long as fifty years—and what China needed above all just now was a strong central government, able by its acts of concern to win and hold the loyalty of the people. No, I did not believe that Chiang Kai-shek could make such a government—he had lost his opportunity. Was China as poor as ever? Yes, although Chinese diplomats and other Chinese abroad might try to give another impression of the country, the common people were as poor as ever. I would not say that all officials were corrupt but alas, many were, and at least most of them were not concerned for the welfare of the people.

Such plain speaking might perhaps have been avoided, but I have never believed that truth can be safely ignored, and so I followed my usual habit of speaking as honestly as I knew. The result was that Chinese Nationalist officials in Sweden were offended, and withdrew their presence from the occasion of the award in Stockholm. I was sorry for that, but it was perhaps inevitable. It would have been difficult for me to accept their presence with the grace of ignorance. In politics I have no interest and governments exist, I believe, only to better the life of their peoples. What other good reason have they to exist?

Sinclair Lewis had said to me, “Don’t let anyone minimize for you the receiving of the Nobel Prize. It is a tremendous event, the greatest of a writer’s life. Enjoy every moment of it, for it will be your finest memory.”

I went to Stockholm with this advice, and it was good and true. I have had much happiness in my life and splendid events have come my way, but, aside from the continuing joys of home, the four days in Stockholm in the year 1938 remain my most perfect single recollection. The award came, as I have said before, at a time when I needed it most. I had met that difficult period of a writer’s life, when the reaction, which the American public invariably bestows upon anyone whom it has discovered and praised, had set in. Since the praise is always too much and too indiscriminate the opposing criticism and contempt are also too much and too indiscriminate. My head had not been turned by the praise and its excess had only amused and touched me, but the rudeness of unjust criticism, a sort of stone-throwing which became merely imitative once it had begun, did temporarily destroy my confidence. The warmth of the Swedish people, combined with their dignity and their calm, restored my soul. It was good to be received, not with adulation, but with respect and affection. I cherish that memory.

In November Stockholm is almost dark, the sun barely near the horizon at midday, but the city blazed with lights and gaiety. We were met at the train and taken to the Grand Hotel and given the royal suite there, charming and comfortable rooms. Service was perfect and everything had been done to make our stay pleasant. That year there were only two persons to receive Nobel awards, and the other person was a gentle little Italian scientist whose name was Enrico Fermi. I had not heard much of him, but he was pleasant to meet and so were his pretty wife and two dark-eyed children. Later he came to the United States, and now everyone knows his name for the work that he has done in developing the atomic bomb. But I could not then have imagined that he had anything to do with the deadly weapon. The fission of the atom? At that time it meant nothing to me.

As soon as we were settled in our rooms, we were called upon by a handsome young man, a Swedish attaché, who brought our schedule with him, and who instructed us with exact courtesy in what would be expected of us. He was a little uncertain of me, I could see, not knowing exactly how an American, the citizen of a republic, would behave in a formal setting. For Sweden combines in the most delightful fashion the utmost modernity within the framework of tradition, and I enjoyed both aspects of this most civilized of nations.

“Tell me, please,” my young instructor said somewhat anxiously in his perfect but accented English, “is it possible that you will object to moving backward from our King after you have received the award? A Soviet citizen did not do so upon a similar occasion.”

I assured him that of course I would not turn my back upon the King. A sigh of relief was my reward for this decision.

He then proceeded to instruct me further, reading aloud from a typed sheet, explaining each detail of the progress planned for the next four days, and I listened with my whole attention, determined to show myself favorably as an American as well as a writer.

The result of such attention is that I remember perhaps in needless detail the procedure of those days. Yet the most memorable hour was of course that of the presentation of the awards, on the evening after the day of our arrival in Stockholm.

When I entered the great Concert Hall the scene was magnificent. Upon the wide platform, decorated with flags and evergreens, the dignified members of the Academy were seated in semicircular arrangement. In the front rows of the crowded hall the royal family, jewelled and splendid, waited in royal calm, while trumpets blared from the galleries.

I sat at the end of the front left row, from whence I could see the whole assembly, and not understanding the preliminary speeches, which were in Swedish, I had time to reflect quietly upon what I saw and to enjoy the occasional music. I shall never forget that scene, yet what I remember most clearly was the instant, half an hour later, when I stood before the dignified and aged King to receive the award, and having made my curtsy, I looked full into his face. In that instant I saw not the King’s face, but the face of my old father, long dead, and everything else I forgot. It was incredible that two men could look so much alike. The tall slender figure, the lean face and strong jaw, the frosty blue eyes, the white moustache cut to the shape of the lips, even the hand that held out the big envelope, were like my father’s. I was so startled that I could scarcely say, “Thank you, Your Majesty,” and I all but forgot my promise not to turn my back. I did not forget, but it was in momentary confusion that I mounted the steps and then backed across the wide stage to my seat. I mention the resemblance here publicly for the first time, but when we were home again I found my father’s portrait and showed it to my husband, and he saw the likeness as clearly as I had. It was no more than accidental, of course, or perhaps there was some reason based on geography, for landscape and climate have a way of creating likeness in the human beings who live upon the same bit of earth, and it is true that my own paternal ancestors came two hundred years ago from the same section of Germany from which the King’s family had come, for the present royal house of Sweden is not an ancient one. Yet it was strange and certainly meaningful for me to have felt my father come alive for me at the great moment.

I remember next the dinner given that night, by the Crown Prince. It took place in the handsome City Hall, very festive with flowers and fine silver. I enjoyed everything but most of all my conversation with the Crown Prince, who, I found, knew a great deal about China, and had a collection of Chinese art objects. We talked at length about that country, so much that I do not remember at all what I ate, and then we talked of the future, he very guarded, of course. But by this time I had listened to enough people in Stockholm to realize that the gathering resolution in Sweden was of another pattern from that which I had perceived in Denmark. Sweden had all but made up her mind to be neutral when the new war broke. There were some who felt that it would be wise to side with Germany, others that such allegiance was impossible. Decision was trembling in the air, and because I felt it deeply important that as an American I must speak with what strength I could for the cause of human freedom, when it came my turn after dinner to make a brief address, I rose and took my place behind a small lectern and there I made my little speech of acceptance of the Nobel award, a speech of no importance to anyone except myself, I am sure, and yet it had to be made, and here it is, as part of my record.

YOUR ROYAL HIGHNESSES:

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN:

It is not possible for me to express all that I feel of appreciation for what has been said and given to me. I accept, for myself, with the conviction of having received far beyond what I have been able to return through my books. I can only hope that the many books which I have yet to write will be in some measure a worthier acknowledgment than I can make tonight. And indeed, I can accept only in the same spirit in which I think this gift was originally given—that it is a prize not so much for what has been done as for the future. Whatever I write in the future must, I think, be always benefited and strengthened when I remember this day.

I accept, too, for my country, the United States of America. We are a people still young and we know that we have not yet come to the fullness of our powers. This award, given to an American, strengthens not only one, but the whole body of American writers, who are encouraged and heartened by such generous recognition. And I should like to say, too, that in my country it is important that this award has been given to a woman. You who have already so recognized your own Selma Lagerlof, and have long recognized women in other fields, cannot perhaps wholly understand what it means in many countries and even in my own, that it is a woman who stands here at this moment. But I speak not only for writers and for women, but for all Americans, for we all share in this occasion.

I should not be truly myself if I did not, in my own wholly unofficial way, speak also of the people of China, whose life has for so many years been my life also, whose life, indeed, must always be a part of my life. The minds of my own country and of China, my foster country, are alike in many ways, but above all, alike in our common love of freedom. And today, more than ever, this is true, now when China’s whole being is engaged in the greatest of all struggles, the struggle for freedom. I have never admired China more than I do now, when I see her uniting her peoples against the enemy who threatens her freedom. With this determination for freedom, which is in so profound a sense the essential quality in her nature, I know that she is unconquerable. Freedom—it is today more than ever the most precious human possession. We—Sweden and the United States—we have it still. My country is young—but it greets you with a peculiar fellowship, you whose earth is ancient and free.

Afterwards, Dr. Fermi’s speech following mine, a burst of singing from the huge court below the hall told us that the evening’s dance was about to begin and the students were already marching in from the university. My pretty stepdaughter had been invited by the son of the Crown Prince to open the dance with him, and like a little Cinderella in her white gown, her eyes shining, she floated down the broad stairway upon his arm and we stood on the balcony above and looked upon the scene, lovely with gaiety and youth.

The crowded happy days followed fast upon one another, and the chief event of the next day was the dinner at the palace with the King. In the interstices of our full program there were visits and newspaper interviews, as a matter of course, and from each of these I gained further knowledge of Sweden and its remarkable people and was thus provided with a background of understanding for later days. A century and more ago Sweden, worn and consumed by its many wars and conflicts with neighboring peoples, had been compelled to face its own condition and to decide whether it would allow itself to be destroyed by the burdens of war, laid upon the people by military leaders whose career was war, or, on the contrary, deny the leaders and build a life of peace, based upon an unchangeable policy of neutrality in all times of war. They chose peace, and in the decades since that fundamental decision, which every nation must make sooner or later if its people are to survive, Sweden has grown steadily in wisdom and prosperity. Neither wisdom nor permanent prosperity is possible for a nation in the constant turmoil of war.

With such ideas crowding my mind, I proceeded on the evening of that day to the palace and found at its entrance many school children waiting for me. I could not forbear lingering and talking with them until the guards at the gate grew a little impatient with me and urged me on so I mounted the wide curving staircase to the rooms where I was to wait, with Dr. Fermi, for the two who were to escort us to the banquet hall.

My memory of that banquet hall is not very clear, I suppose partly because I had already become accustomed to magnificence. Behind every chair was a steward and across the table from me sat the King between two elderly Princesses, the only ladies of sufficiently high rank to be next him. But the vagueness of my memory is partly, too, because I sat next to the King’s brother, Prince William, an explorer and a hunter of big game, a man of wide knowledge and experience, and I became entirely fascinated with his conversation and especially by the account of his visits to the pigmies in Africa. One delicious dish after another was placed before me, the
pièce de résistance
being reindeer steak, I remember, and suddenly, before I knew it, the meal was over. That is, the King rose. The entire extraordinary menu had been served in forty-five minutes! The reason? Court etiquette demands that when the King finishes with a course all plates are removed with his. Some dishes, I fear, I never tasted, for I found my plate gone before I had lifted my fork. The King, a Court lady explained to me afterward, did not usually talk much with the two Princesses, whom he knew very well and had to sit between on many such occasions. Therefore, without conversation, he ate rapidly and hence the fine banquet was soon ended.