In 1948 TIME magazine editor Whittaker Chambers (1901-1961) testified that in the 1930s he helped organize a Communist spy ring in the U.S. government. His accusations against State Department officia...
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Whittaker Chambers was a confessed spy for the Soviet Union and the chief witness in the 1949 perjury trials of Alger Hiss. Chambers accused Hiss, who had been an important official with the U.S. Stat...
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Whittaker Chambers achieved public renown as the principal informant in what became the greatest espionage trial of the Cold War. In August 1948 Chambers informed the House of Representatives' Committ...
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In the following review, Raynolds discusses Witness as a piece of crime fiction, a work of political philosophy, and a testament to moral corruption.
Witness is an impressive report on a representa...
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In the following essay, Abbott contrasts Witness and Lillian Hellman's Scoundrel Time, contending that “both these autobiographies fail from the standpoint of political theory.”
...
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In the following review, Sobran praises the erudition, positive tone, and diversity of the subject matter of Ghosts on the Roof.
The price of believing Alger Hiss has been to cut oneself off from W...
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In the following essay, Horner assesses Chambers's work as a writer for Time and Life magazines, asserting that “although for some, Chambers's way of looking at things will retain...
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In the following essay, Tanenhaus surveys Chambers's literary and journalistic work.
Within the space of a generation—that is, since 1964, when Cold Friday was published to tepid revi...
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In the following review, Brogan maintains that Cold Friday provides much insight into Chambers's life and character.
A man who knew Whittaker Chambers well once told me that he did not belie...
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In the following review, the critic provides a favorable assessment of Notes from the Underground.
[Notes from the Underground] is an intriguing and illuminating correspondence between two of Ameri...
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In the following laudatory review of Notes from the Underground, Buckley describes the friendship between Chambers and journalist Ralph de Toledano, asserting that the letters “beckon to sensit...
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In the following essay, Draper traces Chambers's involvement with the Communist party, his part in the Alger Hiss trial, and the importance of his ideas.
Unlike Alger Hiss, Whittaker Chamber...
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In the following review, Cogley derides what he perceives as Chambers's overblown, messianic self-image in Witness.
In the opening pages of Witness Whittaker Chambers writes,
It is a terr...
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In the following essay, originally published in The Nation in 1952, Howe explores the role of religion and Chambers's approach to Stalinism in Witness, and deems the autobiography disjointed, h...
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In the following review of Odyssey of a Friend, Cort asserts that Chambers's letters expose a superficiality and intellectual narcissism.
The ghost of the late Whittaker Chambers declines to...
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In the following review, Galbraith provides his perspective on the Hiss-Chambers case and emphasizes the insight and value of the letters in Odyssey of a Friend.
One evening in January, 1950, I was...
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In the following positive review, Sheed maintains that Odyssey of a Friend provides insight into Chambers's true political ideology, religious beliefs, friendships, and personality.
A review...
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In the following review of Odyssey of a Friend, Niemeyer explores the enduring impact of the Hiss-Chambers case.
Apart from the praiseworthiness of Henry Regnery's initiative, what is the me...
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In the following essay, McGurn addresses the repercussions of the Hiss-Chambers case, particularly on the conservative movement in the United States.
Twenty-three years after his death, thirty-two ...
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In the following essay, Nieli contends that both Chambers and Eric Voegelin, a political writer and teacher, have similar ideas about Western modernity.
Now the word of the Lord came unto Jonah, th...
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Sam Tanenhaus, editor of The New York Times Book Review, steps out from behind the arras to play a nuanced round of connect-the-dots in his New Republic essay, “The End of the Jour...
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Selected editorial excerpts from the U.S. press:
AN OVERDUE MEMORIAL (The Wall Street Journal, New York)
Considering the enormity of what it commemorates, the Memorial
to the Victims of ...
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National Security: Leftist academics are determined to rehabilitate the reputation of Alger Hiss, the high-level U.S. diplomat and Soviet spy. Time may have passed, but this case was settled a long...
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A Russian researcher, delving anew into once-secret Soviet files from the Cold War, says she has found no evidence that Alger Hiss spied or that Soviet intelligence had any particular interest in h...
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It was grimly unsurprising that the usual suspects lined up to condemn Mark Felt, a.k.a. Deep Throat, as a traitor and a rat for snitching on his putative boss, Richard Nixon. Pat Buchanan, G. Gord...
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Whittaker Chambers
Whittaker Chambers
(David) Whittaker Chambers
Critical Review by Robert Raynolds
Our Critic\'d5s Tip Sheet On Current Reading: Week of July 16th, 2007
