2/2. In Defence of Culture. In another of Frances Stonor Saunders 's programmes about some of the most portentous gatherings in history, she looks at the huge First International Congress of Writers for the Defence of Culture, convened in Paris in 1935. Some of Europe's greatest literary figures, including Boris Pasternak ,
Andre Malraux , EM Forster , Andre Gide , Aldous Huxley and Bertolt Brecht, were amongst the 220 delegates from 40 countries. The agenda was dominated by the question of how to respond to the spectre of the new dictatorships and the social chaos that was growing around them. Producer Matthew Dodd