I also imagine that he is/was haunted by the impact of the CIA on his work, and is maybe hyperconscious of it. I don't know that it influenced his political tendency overall.
I still don't understand what motivated him to trash Blum's book - there may have been good reasons to criticize the book, but he does not seem to have zeroed in on them.
I also don't understand other positions he has taken over the years. I have a grudging admiration for the man, and I learned a lot from him when I was a mere listener. On closer inspection, as with many other people at the station who I admired from a distance, he was not as attractive.
It is hard for me as an under-40 to sit in judgement of the tough choices that people had to make in the 60s and early 70s. I think the Paris Review/CIA thing has to be seen in a wider context. This review article, which you may have already seen, sheds futher light on the significant scope of CIA covert funding.
http://chronicle.com/free/v46/i30/30a01901.htm
Indeed. The Hudson Review, The Sewanee Review, Poetry, Daedalus, and The Kenyon Review all benefited from a C.I.A.-backed program to boost the sales of the right sort of publication. The Kenyon Review was edited by C.I.A. agent Robie Macauley; The Paris Review was cofounded by then-C.I.A. employee Peter Matthiessen.
Joe W.
>From: Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com>
>Reply-To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
>To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
>Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] KPFA's Hidden History
>Date: Tue, 28 Jun 2005 10:59:54 -0400
>
>So, Joseph, do you really think that Larry Bensky is an avatar of Langley?
>
>Doug
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