Haunted Controversy
Theoharis, Athan
Haunted Controversy FRIENDSHIP AND FRATRICIDE: AN ANAYSIS OF WHITTAKER CHAMBERS AND ALGER HISS, by Meyer A. Zeligs, M.D. The Viking Press. 476 pp. $8.95. Reviewed by Athan Theoharis T N...
...In his account, Chambers sought to justify his own central role...
...Dr...
...Specifically, we must learn about the role of the FBI and the Justice Department in the development of evidence for the case...
...Zeligs brings forth much information—some original, some a detailed restatement— but his psychological orientation limits his analysis...
...I find Zeligs' thesis overly neat and compact...
...These actions, which were strategic or tactical political choices, were influenced by the political environment...
...Conceding that Chambers was a sociopath, motivated by an obsession with death and birth, living in his own created fantasy world, one could still conclude that in this particular case he represented reality...
...It kept him in a state of emotional ferment, directing his loves and hates, driving him to destroy and to recreate...
...A more critical political study is necessary, which would concentrate principally on the nature of the evidence and Chambers' impersonal, but detailed knowledge of Alger Hiss and radical reversal in testimony...
...Because of most historians' and political scientists' ignorance of psychology, this book should serve as a valuable corrective...
...Haunted Controversy FRIENDSHIP AND FRATRICIDE: AN ANAYSIS OF WHITTAKER CHAMBERS AND ALGER HISS, by Meyer A. Zeligs, M.D...
...His childhood frustration embroiled him in a lifelong pattern of ambivalence of thought and feeling...
...Zeligs defends Hiss' Congressional testimony and defense of his innocence in the latter's book, In the Court of Public Opinion, as reflecting an orderly, compulsive, humane but impersonally objective man, influenced by his childhood and family expectations...
...Witness is more of a political than a psychological source...
...Zeligs suggests that the political context of the 1930's, and the cold war, are irrelevant to understanding the relationship and testimony of the two men, and that Chambers' Communism and subsequent anti-Communism resulted from his troubled childhood, his obsession with death and birth, and more specifically his relation to his parents and reaction to his brother's suicide...
...It is difficult to accept the author's basic assumption that Chambers' and Hiss's responses and decisions in the 1940's were psychologically motivated...
...Alger Hiss cooperated fully with the author...
...Zeligs adds to our knowledge about the human beings involved, but his psychological approach ignores far more relevant and significant matters...
...In sum, this is a worthwhile book, imperative for the student of the post-World War II period, but limited because of its scope and interpretive approach...
...The deep turmoil within him never abated...
...Zeligs' thesis is that the contradictory, complex nature of the case cannot be assessed without an understanding of the psychological motives and forces influencing these two individuals...
...More importantly, I would criticize Zeligs' misuse of Witness...
...Zeligs recounts the indirect aid the F.B.I, provided Chambers, the indirect intimidation and pressure on Edward Case, Timothy Hobson, Alger Hiss, and the grand jury...
...The study is original in approach and exhaustively researched...
...In his concluding remarks, Dr...
...Zeligs has examined all the available sources: the Congressional hearings, court testimony, defense appeals, Hiss' and Chambers' personal correspondence, and miscellaneous writings...
...The fears and fantasies that filled his earliest years inexorably predetermined his future thought and actions...
...Whittaker Chambers and his family, however, refused to provide any additional or personal information, restricting Zeligs' analysis of Chambers to Chambers' writings, principally his autobiography, Witness...
...it is Chambers' effort to justify his role in the Hiss case, to establish his credibility and importance, his nobility and patriotism...
...The book's positive qualities result from this psychoanalytical orientation, which provides fascinating insights into the factors that led individuals like Chambers to become Communists and, when recanting, to become virulent, nihilistic anti-Communists...
...A fascinating and revealing book, Witness cannot be accepted as an account of the motives and forces that influenced Chambers' life in the 1930's or 1940's...
...Zeligs' notes and documentary materials undoubtedly will constitute his most significant contribution to future studies of the Hiss-Chambers case...
...Reviewed by Athan Theoharis T N THIS meticulously researched book, Meyer Zeligs, a practicing psychoanalyst, offers new insights into the Hiss-Chambers controversy of the 1940's...
...Individual decisions are not predetermined but responsive...
...Zeligs aptly sums up this thesis: "Whittaker Chambers' life must be viewed as one prolonged span of psychic conflict...
...Dr...
...In addition, the Hiss case, while the most significant event in Chambers' life, had been successfully prosecuted because the government urged the jury to base its decision on the documentary evidence and not Chambers' credibility...
...In Witness, published in 1952, Chambers attempted to defend his changed testimony and explain why he had not earlier turned this information over to the FBI...
...Judged by what insights the reader might gain about the Hiss-Chambers case, however, the book is disappointing...
...My contention is that Zeligs' psychological interpretation is not convincing and is, in a sense, irrelevant to the Hiss-Chambers case...
...Zeligs further suggests that Hiss' initial attraction to Chambers was based on Chambers' similarity to Hiss' brother Bosley and, conversely, that Chambers' friendship and destruction of Hiss was reflective of Chambers' identification with his brother Richard and his death-birth obsession...
Vol. 31 • April 1967 • No. 4
