The Books That Take Revenge, Centuries Later
A new history of the Red Scare prompts the question: Does literature still have enough influence to bring down the powerful?
Fiction
Books
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Who Came Up With That?
Contrary to what we think of as intellectual property, most ideas are difficult to trace back to one human mind.
The Questionable Triumph of the ‘Baling Wire Hippies’
Stewart Brand’s Whole Earth Catalog was seen as a countercultural milestone, but his new book reveals his alliances with the powerful.
What To Read
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Eight of the Most Fascinating Biographies to Read
Each is animated by the author’s love—for their subject, for language, and for pushing the boundaries of what the genre can do.
Six Books That Simply Must Be Talked About
These six books demand discussion—with a pal, a date, or a book club.
Nine Books to Reset Your View of the World
Each of these titles will widen your perspective, offering you original insight and vision.
Seven Books to Read When You Have No Time to Read
These titles are worth picking up, even if you have only a moment to spare.
The Last Voyage
A veteran of World War II, TOM FILER served with the Navy in the Pacific and then spent three years in business before deciding to go back to college. At U.C.L.A. he came under the spell of Kenneth Macgowan, whose playwriting seminar and whose inspiration started him upon his writing. For three months he worked on a tuna boat in the Mexican coastal waters, and from his experience has come the following story.
The Pine Tree
A graduate of the University of Arizona, a part-time student at Arizona State College, and the father of two children, JOHN A. KEENAN makes his home in Tempe, Arizona, where he is employed as a rehabilitation counselor. “The charm of the Southwest,” writes Mr. Keenan, “is its people; its little people, who reflect ourselves uncluttered by the weird trappings of this scientific age. To be Indian, Mexican, Negro, or white is to be American. And this is why I write.”
A Life in Art
A Londoner who cherishes every vestige of the cockney, WOLF MANKOWITZ divides his time between authoritative studies of the Portland vase, humorous articles for Punch, and fiction. His two novels, Make Me an Offer and A Kid for Two Farthings, were made into films, and the following story will appear in a collection of his short stories, The Mendelman Fire, to be published by Atlantic-Little, Brown later this year.
A Kelly Green Sweater
Now in his rarly thirties. MITCHELL J. STRUCINSKI was born on Chicago’s south side, where he went through grade school and then worked red at several odd jobs in packing houses and stock rooms. During World War II he served with the Merchant Marine. It was at this time that his literary interests were aroused; and with thr tutoring of a fellow officer, he spent three years catching up on the education he had missed. He has bern writing seriously for the past six years. His first published story appeared in the Atlantic last November.
The Music Teacher
NATHANIEL LAMAR, who was born in Atlanta. Georgia, twenty-two years ago, prepared for Harvard at Phillips Exeter. He majored in English and found particular stimulus for his writing in the courses which he took under Archibald MacLeish. Mr. La Mar’s first story in the Atlantic, “Creole Love Song, won the Dana Reed Award at Harvard and was reprinted in The Best American Stories, 1956. Last autumn he began to work on his first novel; and to assist in its completion, we have awarded him an Atlantic Grant in Fiction.
Pericles on 34th Street
After ten years of writing and rejection, HARRY MARK PETRAKIS hit our target right in the center with this pungent starv. Mr. Pet raids is thirty-three years old, married, anti has two young sons. When yon are in your early ttreaties,” he wrote, publication seems a story away. It is only later that you learn the obligations of talent. You learn that no one can really do for you that which has to be done. Yon learn what it means to try to balance the wanting to write within the nomad patterns of life and family. From arrogance you come full circle to humility when for days oral weeks and even months there appears to be no sane reason for continuing.”
My Mother's Hands
“My colorless career‘" writes ROBERT FONTAINE, “includes everything from a window dresser’s assistant in Ottawa to a comptometer operator in the National City Bank of New York. A little over a decade ago I discovered I could write and that writing was the ideal occupation for a man who liked to get up at noon and watch the bluejays go to bed. I have been at it ever since.”Theatergoers will remember Mr. Fontaine’s play, The Happy Time, which was such a success on Broadway a few years ago.
Sassenach
A native of Belfast, Ireland. BRAIN MOORIE: emigrated to Canada, where his first job was that of a clerk in a bush camp in northern Ontario. From there he went to Montreal, where he took on proofreading for The Gazette and in time graduated to reporter and rewrite man. He now is a Canadian citizen living in Montreal and is devoting fall time to his writing. Mr. Moore‘s first novel, The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne, was published last year under the Atlantic-Little, Brown imprint, and his second will appear shortly.