Record of a Friendship

are the worst enemies of anything that is moving or changeable, be it
social, biological or otherwise. Now, the Russian dictators picked up
this issue and had Lysenko· fight against the American geneticists on
the basis that acquired characteristics can be transmitted to the next
generation. This, in itself, is true. However, the motives are decisive in
this case. It is a purely political issue and has nothing to do with deciding
any scientific matters.
It is quite clear that, had the Americans represented the idea of the
inheritance of acquired characteristics, the Russians would have de­
fended mystical geneticism.
Would you be kind enough to gather all the material and opinions
you can find in England on the healthy child, and bring them over here
next year?

Summerhill School

Leiston, Suffolk

My dear Reich,

• I •

July 18 , 19 49

Thanks for the Bulletin and Character A nalysis. Owing to end

of term and countless tiresome visitors I haven't had time to read both

thoroughly, but your schizophrenia case I had to read to the end. Reich,

it is the most fascinating case I have ever re ad. It is a classic of the

future. There is only one big snag: is there another man who could have

treated it so? There isn't, and that brings up the question of how much

a man's work can get across to others. Incidentally, the case demon­

strates finally your point that orgone therapy can be done by doctors

only, and one good (or bad) effect of that case is that a man called Neill

has decided to give up trying o. therapy.

Ena and I have both that exhausted feeling we get after a heavy term

giving out to the kids all the time. And I begin to feel age now, find it

difficult to get up when Zoe makes me lie with her on the floor. Yet I

can dance all night.

• Trofim Lysenko, Russian agronomist and biologist. Leader of Soviet school
  of genetics which declared that characteristics acquired through environmental
  influences are inherited.