Thirty Years of Treason: Excerpts from Hearings Before the House Committee on Un-American Activities, 1938-1968 [Paperback]

Eric Bentley (Compiler), Frank Rich (Compiler)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1560253681 | ISBN-13: 978-1560253686 | Publication Date: January 9, 2002 | Edition: Second Edition

The testimony that the author has gleaned for this book from the thirty-year record of the House Un-American Activities Committee focuses on HUAC’s treatment of artists, intellectuals, and performers. This highly readable and absorbing collection of significant excerpts from the hearings shows with painful clarity how HUAC grew from a panel that investigated possible subversive activities in a “dignified” manner to a huge, unrelenting accusatory finger from which almost no one was safe. This book serves as a warning for the future and creates living history from the documentary record. “The basic document with which all future studies of the [House Un-American Activities] Committee will have to begin.” —Dalton Trumbo “...what he has done is give us HUAC as spectacle, and the perspective is shattering.”—Victor Navasky, The New York Times

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Bentley is better known for writing about the theater, but here he culls numerous records from the House Un-American Activities Committee, which grilled Hollywood writers and actors, among others. Bentley gleans excerpts from those sessions from 1938 to 1968 and includes testimony by Ayn Rand, Gary Cooper, Ring Lardner Jr., Sterling Hayden, Lillian Hellman, Arthur Miller, Zero Mostel, Tom Hayden, and more. Portraying a dark chapter in our nation's history that needs to be remembered, this 1971 volume could do double duty in history and theater collections.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Paperback: 1000 pages
• Publisher: Nation Books; Second Edition edition (January 9, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1560253681
• ISBN-13: 978-1560253686
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.6 x 2.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,726,166 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Hard core history, February 22, 2002

By 

robert luhn (Albany, ca USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Thirty Years of Treason: Excerpts from Hearings Before the House Committee on Un-American Activities, 1938-1968 (Paperback)

A fascinating book--we're talking transcripts of the sessions before the HUAC. You'll discover who sang for the committee (and how loudly; some of the famous people who caved before the committee will suprise you), and those who ran it in riotous circles. The best reads: Zero Mostel, Pete Seeger, and Tom Hayden. Original history, without the filters. (The index, however, is terrible.) A must have.

5 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Update re: Origin of HUAC, January 14, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Thirty Years of Treason: Excerpts from Hearings Before the House Committee on Un-American Activities, 1938-1968 (Paperback)

This book is a useful historical resource. Since it was first published in the early 1970's, I wonder: is there an updated version revealing the remarkable fact, discovered from Soviet archives, that HUAC was actually founded on direct orders from Moscow -- through a serving United States Congressman on the Soviet payroll -- in order to monitor White Russians and Bundists in the US? This underreported by undeniable fact seems important to give context to the post-WWII controversy over HUAC: not because it justifies denials of civil liberties but because it is true and should be part of the picture presented to those seeking to inform themselves on the issue. An update no doubt could cover other things as well, but certainly this I would hope.

10 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars 1000 pages of truth, January 6, 2002

By 

Jerome Clegg (New York City, New York United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Thirty Years of Treason: Excerpts from Hearings Before the House Committee on Un-American Activities, 1938-1968 (Paperback)

This books tells the amazing story of the notorious House Unamerican Activities Committee, 1938 to l968, and tells it in a highly dramatic way -- presenting the reader with the actual dialogues that took place in the committee room. It is a tale of folks you have heard of, but never seen in this light before -- among the names are Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon, Gary Cooper, Paul Robeson, Jerome Robbins, Zero Mostel, Elia Kazan...,and on and on. A rogues' gallery? Well,judge for yourself which guys are the rogues and which the heroes (if any)...In any event, the book is a terrific read.