Alien ink

by Natalie S. Robins

Alien Ink is the most comprehensive book yet written on how the Federal Bureau of Investigation waged war against American writers and readers from the early years of this century. As Natalie Robins reveals for the first time, this assault on freedom of expression began long before iron-fisted J. Edgar Hoover joined the Justice Department and made his name synonymous with that of the FBI for over forty years. The war carried over into the 1980s, when librarians, as part. Of a Library Awareness Program, were recruited to spy on readers. Drawing on nearly 150 files released to the author under the Freedom of Information Act, Natalie Robins's absorbing narrative offers compelling new documentary evidence about the hounding and intimidation of writers ranging from John Reed to Allen Ginsberg, from Edna St. Vincent Millay to James Baldwin, and from Walter Winchell to Robert Lowell--a virtual Who's Who of American letters. Alien Ink is the. Story of hidden agendas and hidden powers, and cont