Russians in Wall Street

As cartoonist for Krokodil, Moscow's sardonic magazine of humor-plus-propaganda, Vitaly Goriaev has many times bitterly lampooned Wall Street as the rotten heart of decadent capitalism. Last week, touring Manhattan as the guest of the American Association of Editorial Cartoonists, Goriaev was candidly eager to see what the place is really like. Heading toward the Street in a taxicab, he thought he could sense the pace of city life accelerating. "Time is money," he said. "The closer you get to Wall Street, the more the tempo picks up."

What chills, what fears, what seductive impressions crossed the Russian's mind as at last he saw the place he had drawn so often and so critically? He cautiously refused to say, but did get out his drawing book for a sketch from life (see cut) that will presumably serve him well when he once again sits down at his drawing board in Russia.

Goriaev and fellow traveling cartoonist Ivan Semeonov, who is also Krokodil's art editor, are in the U.S. for three weeks, invited by Dan Bowling, cartoonist for the Republican New York Herald Tribune and president of the U.S. cartoonists. The Russians' deft drawings of the U.S. are being carried by the HT, will appear in a LIFE article next week. The tourists attended the association's convention in Indianapolis last week, will also meet Walt Disney in Los Angeles.

Far more exciting to them is a planned visit to the home of one of their favorite Americans, Mark Twain, in Hannibal, Mo. So taken was Goriaev by Huckleberry Finn's adventures on the Mississippi that he ran away from home at the age of eleven and briefly floated down the Dnieper on a raft. Goriaev, who has drawn the Statue of Liberty wearing policeman's boots and carrying a club marked Racism and Segregation, illustrated Russian editions of both Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer.

Semeonov and Goriaev made entranced tourists. Goriaev was charmed by the casual tempo of Washington Square, blinked at a man resting with his shoes off. Said he: "There is great humanity in that." Shuttling to Washington, D.C. for a day, they marveled at the give-and-take between newsmen and President Eisenhower at a press conference. "It's like pupils in school," chuckled Semeonov. "The reporters all jump up at once and shout, and the President points at one and says 'you.' " Asked why he never criticizes the Soviet government in his cartoons, Semeonov deadpanned: "In the Soviet Union we have a tradition not to draw cartoons critical of people whom everyone respects and admires."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.