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Book Review - Commies: A Journey Through the Old Left, the New Left and the Leftover Left by Ronald Radosh

By J. Wesley ⋅ May 10, 2008 ⋅  Email This Post ⋅  Print This Post ⋅ Post a comment

Commies: A Journey Through the Old Left, the New Left and the Leftover Left is the best sort of memoir, a charming, controversial, score-settling peek into a world otherwise hidden from outsiders — in this case, the world of American Communists and fellow-travelers. Written by a red diaper baby, the book opens in the tightly-knit world of the New York City Jewish immigrant community during the late 1930s.

To those raised on the notion that American Communists were a McCarthyite myth, it will be a novelty to read of Radosh’s yearly vacations at one of four Communist summer camps operating in the U.S. (his was often frequented by Woody Guthrie) and his education at the “little Red schoolhouse” — Elizabeth Irwin School. Radosh began his activist career with the Communist youth, working to free the Rosenbergs after they were arrested for spying. From there he entered into the New Left during the 1960s, helping to found the movement. Along the way, Radosh rubbed elbows with practically everyone on the hard Left: Michael Harrington; Ed Asner; Obama’s terrorist pal Bernadine Dorn; Irving Howe; Bianca Jagger; Bob Dylan; Henry Wallace and a host of others.

Commies operates on multiple levels. Anyone looking for a big picture view of the hard Left will find it here (though Rise and Fall of the American Left by Diggins is more comprehensive.) More personally, Radosh recounts his journey from fervent Communist to staunch advocate of the United States and its way of life. This transition began with his attempts in the 1970s to prove the innocence of the Rosenbergs. When he discovered that they truly were spying for the Soviets, it shook his faith deeply. Moreover, his publication of these findings caused his expulsion from the Left, with old friends declaring him an enemy of the cause. In typical Soviet fashion, even respected Marxist historians such as Paul Buhle of Brown University and Columbia’s Eric Foner have written Radosh out of the history of the American Left. His memoir serves as a corrective to the official record. It isn’t hard to see why they want him forgotten — this is a man who knows quite a few inconvenient truths.