WOMAN TODAY.

London

MARCH, 1939.

THE interest taken in a great artist by his public naturally, though perhaps somewhat indiscreetly, extends to his home life. Dozens and dozens of times people have asked me: "What is Paul Robeson's wife like?"

There is a certain telephone number in London, the secret of which you couldn't buy for all the gold in the world. It is guarded jealously by Essie Robeson. But if you happen to be a friend of hers and do get through, you will be met at the other end of the wire by a rich laughing voice "Hello, Honey!"—yet underneath that voice's vitality and gaiety, there is a firmness which well expresses its owner's character.

"Paul and I first met," Essie told me one day, "when we were both students at Columbia University, New York. Paul was then studying law and was also the prize athlete of the University Football Team. I was studying medicine, after taking my degree in chemistry. It may amuse you to know that I was told by many singing teachers that with my voice I ought to go in for grand opera. But I didn't want to study singing—I only wanted to, and later did, become a pathological chemist at Presbyterian Hospital, New York."

At this point you feel the firmness in the lovely voice that refused to become the servant of music because its owner was frankly more interested in science.

"After we had been living in England for some years," Essie continued, "I decided to take up anthropology really seriously. I wanted to find out something about the so-called primitive races, being a member of one myself! So I studied it both at the London School of Economics and at University College. In order to get my Ph.D. degree, I had to do a certain amount of field work.

"I chose to go and work among the cattle-people of Uganda in the Toro country, which is romantically situated in Central Africa at the foot of the Mountains of the Moon. As a woman of their own race, I found myself and my little boy quite happily and naturally accepted in the kraals by both men and womenfolk. They were very friendly towards us and I was able to get a lot of material which probably no European anthropologist could have obtained. I am at present writing it up for my thesis."

"Your little boy?" I asked, in amazement.

"Sure," answered Essie, "you don't think that I would have left Pauli behind whilst I trotted off to Africa on my own."

"How old was he," I asked, "when he came with you."

"Eight," was the answer, "and even then he was already a real little man. On the voyage home I became very ill. I had picked up a germ in Africa which for months caused me a great deal of suffering. When I got home, I was carried out of the aeroplane into an ambulance and straight into a nursing-home. During the whole voyage, Pauli did not have to be looked after. He looked after me."

WOMAN TODAY.

MARCH, 1939.

INTIMATE INTERVIEWS, No. 1

WITH
THE ROBESONS

By "CLARE"

Young Pauli is now a sturdy fellow of eleven. Physically, he bids fair to follow in his father's athletic footsteps. Mentally, he is as talented as one would expect the child of such exceptional parents to be. Already he speaks English, Russian and German fluently.

Essie did not mention, but I can testify to this from mouth-watering experience, that she is a magnificent cook. With true American efficiency, she has arranged the kitchen of her new house on the same floor as her dining-room. The latter is intimate and cosy rather than large and pompous, and so there are never more guests to a meal than Essie can provide for herself. After my last meal at the Robesons, I felt I would have to think seriously of the streamline. But Essie's food is too delicious to resist a second helping.

Essie and Paul, and young Pauli too, are quite used to dashing all over the globe at a moment's notice—to New York, to Madrid, to Moscow—if there is anything interesting they want to do or if they think that they can be of help to their fellow human beings. But their home is in London now, and they love it.

There is probably no film, stage or concert artist in England to-day whose personal popularity is greater than that of Paul Robeson. Wherever he sings, audiences pack concert-rooms and halls.

Whilst they listen to Paul's deep golden voice, they are united by the profoundest and most justified of all thrills, that which can only be given by a really great artist. A man of genuine and wide culture, with an equal understanding of the dialects of Africa and the languages of Asia, Paul ranges the world for the folk-songs on which he is an authority.

From the songs of protest of negro chain-gang workers to the plaintive music of the Hebrides, from the twinkling humour of the Creole to the battle-songs of the Chinese soldier patriot, Paul is equally at home with all melodies and all languages.

Film fans clamour to see him in pictures. Directors wring their hands because no money on earth nowadays will persuade him to appear in a film if he thinks that it has an undercurrent extolling tyranny or tends to show up the common man or woman in an unfavourable light. Offer after offer is turned down if the film magnate tries to use what should be legitimate entertainment for underground propaganda.

Paul is probably happiest when sitting in his book-lined study rehearsing a new folk-song or studying the languages and customs of an American, African or Oriental people; or when feeling the quick and absolutely sincere response of a working-class audience.

Like all of us, the Robesons have their little weaknesses. Essie is one of those people who can't bear to have a cat in the room and you won't get her to come and visit you unless pussy has been got out of the way first. Paul, probably one of the most travelled men in the world, has never yet been persuaded by anyone to take to the air. It remains to be seen whether Pauli will decide one of these days to become a zoologist or an aviator. He says, firmly, that he will be an aeroplane engineer.
CLARE.

2, R 54

ROBESON'S WIFE

by
Hannen
Swaffer

FRIDAY, DAILY HERALD JUNE 3, 1932.

WRITES A PLAY

PAUL ROBESON'S wife has put all her long experience of negro life and character into a play which she calls "Uncle Tom's Cabin."

It has been accepted by the Theatre Guild in New York, and it is now being read, for London, by C. B. Cochran.

Uncle Tom and His Cabin

NEGRO characters provide the best drama when they are seen in contrast with the white life around them.

Mrs. Robeson, knowing this, has shown the effect of the tour of a coloured orchestra through Europe.

"Uncle Tom," as they call him, is the head of a coloured troupe of musicians. The "Cabin," I believe, is the Harlem cabaret where they start, and then, becoming successful, they travel to London, Paris, Berlin and Moscow, ending in the Harlem from which they came.

High Spots of Drama

ALL around them, during their tour, there have been high spots of drama. Romance has surrounded them. Tragedy has been on the fringe of their lives.

But they seem utterly indifferent to it all. They are just a band of coloured musicians, who go out on tour, and return again, not conscious that anything unusual has happened.

There is a great motive in this, as anyone knows, as I do, the effect of all these negro companies on the different civilisations around them.

Paul's Baby Son

RECENTLY, Mrs. Robeson has been living in Vienna. She found it easier for her small son, who, although popular on the heath where he played— I remember that when the Robesons lived at Hampstead, people would touch the child's head for luck—might have found it embarrassing when he grew a little older.

Paul Robeson and his wife have, in England, more than once been rudely treated by people who do not understand that the colour line is something created by white people when they enslave coloured races.

"Vienna behaves to us naturally," says Mrs. Robeson. "I was happy there."

Silly Stories

WHEN Paul Robeson's life was published a year or two ago, Mrs. Robeson was the author. The book was well written and a proof that she has a great sense of underlying character. I hope her play will be done in London.

By the way, I must deny the silly stories that have been going round about Paul Robeson, stories as malicious as they are

sensational. They started in New York. Paul is a man entitled to all our respect. His friends, at any rate, remember this.