Story of International Relations

4 INTELLECTUAL COOPERATION IN WAR-TIME AND PLANS ... 355

literature, so full of humanity, of the so-called ‘backward’ peoples, who are

‘backward’ only for the standardising judge; the so-called indigenous folk

arts so overflowing with freshness and vitality; and the feeling for life of

these small nations, much deeper than might be thought and much wor-

thier of posterity than might be imagined.^16

One reason why I have highlighted Mistral’s observations concerning
the originality of peoples is because they foreshadow much of the debate
that would take place at UNESCO at its inception on the question of
culture. It suffices to say here that Mistral’s letter suggests that the ICO
was more open to cultural variety than was later thought. The contribu-
tions of Latin American writers and intellectuals to the work of the ICO
were particularly important in demonstrating this. At the same time, these
same writers and intellectuals rendered an important service to the ICO
by unhesitatingly reminding it on occasion of the degree to which it was
culturally insular. It is noteworthy that the last piece of correspondence
published by the IIIC was an extract from a letter written by the Mexican
writer Francisco Garcia Calderon, a letter which was intended to be the
point de départ for a planned volume entitled L’Amérique et l’Europe and
which was to be devoted exclusively to Latin American writers. Planned as
a follow-up to the Conversation sponsored by the Permanent Committee
of Letters and Arts in Buenos-Aires in 1936 under the rubric of Europe-
Amérique latine, this volume, as well as the planned volume based on the
letters of Almeida, Huizinga, Mistral et al., was not destined to appear.^17

tHe orgAnisAtion of internAtionAl studies in genevA:

februAry–APril 1940

It was due to the political situation and in order to try and maintain the
ICO’s politically neutral image and uphold the idea of the political impar-
tiality of the League, that the League Secretariat, (which would remain
under the direction of Avenol until August 31, 1940, the date on which
Avenol would quit Geneva), informed Bonnet, to the displeasure of both
Bonnet and Murray, that the December meeting IIIC’s executive and
administrative committees would be held in Geneva rather than where they

(^16) Ibid., 124, 128.
(^17) Informations sur la Coopération Intellectuelle (a), nos. 1–2 (1939), 3, and ‘Lettre
de M. Francisco Garcia Calderon à M. Aita,’ Informations sur la Coopération Intellectuelle,
nos. 7–8 (1940): 253–55.