'So Jim C reckons that the blessed Ewan was ignorant of Stalin's crimes till 1956. Strange how everyone else was perfectly familiar with the many and varied accounts of what had been going on. Especially in Communist circles, where such things were widely discussed and totally well-known (though obviously publicly denied).'

Can I respectfully suggest a book to you Greg. Its called In the Thirties by Edward Upward. Upward was Christopher Isherwood's greatest friend and literary mentor as a young man. Whilst Isherwood and Auden went off to America in 1939, Upward stayed in England working as a suburban teacher - and believing profoundly in Marxism and the Soviet model of society.

The trauma felt by English party members, dealt by Kruschev by denouncing Stalin and his crimes at the 20th party congress is dealt with in the book. let me assure you the sense of loss of an ideal was something that MacColl would not have been alone in feeling, and it was shared by millions of communists across the world.

My own father was extremely sceptical of the American line in the cold war - after all in the wartime the BBC had spoke of our ally as Father Joe Stalin - the volte face after Churchill's iron curtain speech took a bit of swallowing by anyone who was interested in politics. However my Dad had a fair bit of contact with the Russian troops and their sheer brutality scared him - and this was a guy who had fought all the way through France and the Low Countries in the Irish Guards.

MacColl of course saw the Russians in a different light - they were putting on his plays behind the Iron curtain. he must have had cultural ties with them. It must have been a kick in the guts to discover your work was being championed by a mass murderer.