Writers on the left

By Daniel AARON

Subjects: literature and politics, American writers, American literature-early 20th century, literary history, Communism-American

Description: WRITERS ON THE LEFT chronicles the involvement of many well-known 20th century American writers with the critical style and politics of the American communist movement. Emphasizing the emergence of communism in the U.S., Aaron traces the influence of the movement among writers from early bohemian days in the second decade of the century, through it's heyday in the 20s and 30s, finally describing its gradual dissolution in the 1940s. Aaron creates perceptive, often poignant portraits of writers like Max Eastman, Floyd Dell, John Reed, Mike Gold and Joseph Freeman, who tried to wed the sometimes conflicting desires for uninhibited artistic expression and the abolition of inequalities of class and race. Aaron also discusses the attraction of communism for more ambivalent but influential fellow travelers such as Edmund Wilson, Malcolm Cowley, John Dos Passos, Theodore Dreiser, Richard Wright and Langston Hughes.