'He had a gigantic presence'

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Blacklisted as "un-American"Last week's Magazine article on singer Paul Robeson prompted a wave of e-mails from readers recollecting meeting the great man, including Roger and Michael Seifert.

Paul Robeson was a frequent visitor to our parents' home in Highgate, north London.

It was a beautiful and substantial house near Hampstead Heath. There was a large formal back garden backing on to open fields.

It was on several long summer evenings that he visited the family and entertained us with his adventures, and spoke of his distress at his treatment at the hands of the American political and cultural establishment.

Exotic mixture

This was in the late 1950s, at the height of the Cold War, when attacks on Robeson's politics were overwhelming his iconic status as a black superstar.

Our father, Sigmund Seifert, was a lawyer representing many escapees from McCarthyism, especially from Hollywood and the left circle surrounding film, literature and academic life.

Many intended to settle in the UK and dad acted on their behalf with the immigration service. Paul Robeson was friends with many of them and so came to meet and support them at the house.

We were lucky enough to witness his greatness at first hand <a href="/1/hi/magazine/5345904.stm" class="">Soul man</a>

He was a huge man, made larger by both the fact that we were children and that his voice and personality were both so powerful. His was handsome, physically in great shape, gentle and laughed at himself when gently poked into it by our father's great charm and wit.

Both my parents entertained on a grand scale and the house was full of the exotic mixture of leftwingers, ranging from British trade union leaders to American exiles and the cosmopolitan mix of the London left.

On several occasions we met up with the Robesons at Fox Warren - a luxury Surrey estate owned by Hannah Weinstein, a film maker who made a major impact on UK television at the time. She was another leftwing exile and employed several blacklisted writers on the scripts of her TV productions such as Robin Hood.

We also all went as a family - with our parents and two sisters, Ruth and Susan - to see Paul Robeson play Othello at Stratford. It was an event that remains vivid in the mind 50 years on. It was as spellbinding as any performance could be and his majestic voice rumbled over his lines as approaching thunder.

Solidarity

His personal persecution at the hands of the American authorities and elite, the lies and false propaganda, all made his stage plight as the Moor of Venice more bitter and more tragic.

The most memorable moment was when he sang a full repertoire of his songs in our back garden after a large-scale dinner party. The dinner and the singing were to raise support - financial and political - for a printing press for Cheddi Jagon - the oft ousted premier of what was then British Guyana.

Every time he was elected the British government cancelled the results, sometimes with the use of troops, and put in a puppet regime. He and his party, the PPP, were in need of help.

Paul Robeson was happy to give him all the help necessary, and we were lucky enough to witness his greatness at first hand: the wonderful singing, the powerful and gigantic presence, and the solidarity with others in struggle.

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