Advertisement

The Nation - News from Sept. 30, 1987

Share

More than 50 of America’s most prominent authors were kept under surveillance by the FBI and other government agencies because their writings were considered subversive, according to an article in New Yorker magazine. Among the writers under surveillance were Ernest Hemingway, labeled a drunk and a Communist; Sinclair Lewis and Pearl Buck, criticized for promoting black civil rights; John Steinbeck, accused of tarnishing the nation’s image, and Truman Capote, targeted as a “supporter of the (Cuban) revolution.” New Yorker contributor Herbert Mitgang, in an article in the Oct. 5 issue, said he obtained portions of the government dossiers through the Freedom of Information Act.

Advertisement