POLAND BEHIND THE " IRON CURTAIN "
SIR,—When postal communication with Poland was restored in the second half of the last year, no restrictions were placed on the sending of books and papers. However, in January this year the Polish Minister of Finance in Warsaw announced that printed matter was henctforth prohibited. I have confirmed by personal inquiry at the Polish Consulate that this prohibition includes scientific books and journals. I could get no advice how permission for sending books could be obtained. This means that Poland is now completely insulated from contact with Western science at a time when her libraries and book stocks have been virtually destroyed.
This prohibition breaks a tradition of many hundreds of years during which Poland has striven to maintain her part in European culture. For example, even in the Poland of Pilsudski it was always possible to buy British newspapers, including those which, like The Manchester Guardian or The New Statesman, were strongly critical of the regime. The Polish people would have never consented to such a break unless great pressure had been brought to bear on them from outside. The fact that it has happened shows how limited the independence of the new " democratic Poland " really is. Only people who have suffered such deprivation can realise what it means to live behind the " iron curtain " now stretching
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