BOOKS
OBSESSED WITH THE FIFTIES
NAMING NAMES. By Victor S. Navasky.
The Viking Press. $15.95.
Victor Navas ky's
N aming Names
can be read with interes t
a nd eve n fas cina ti on as a n ethnogra phy of Holl ywoood's "red
subculture" a t the time of the HUAC inves tiga ti ons a nd the
blackli st. The subj ec t is ha rdl y a neglected one, but no one before
Navas ky has sought out a nd interviewed so ma ny H ollywood ex–
Communists including both those who "named names" to HUAC
a nd those who suffered blackli sting from the ori gina l H ollywood T e n
of 1947 through the 1950s.
N aming N ames
conta ins a wealth of "thick
description ," for the author allows hi s subj ects complete freedom to
speak fo r themselves. The scope a nd a uthenticity of Navasky's
reporting can be gauged from the fac t tha t one need scarcely go
beyond the evidence he himself presents to a rri ve a t a view a t
vari a nce with hi s own , one tha t rej ects or contradicts ma ny of the
mora l a nd political judgments he asserts or assumes in drawing up
hi s ros ter of the ju t a nd the unju st.
Na va sky chooses to defin e hi s book as a "mo ral detec tive story"
ra ther tha n as hi story or ethnogra phy . H ence hi s title a nd a
foreword on the obloquy with which huma n be ings have a llegedl y
through the ages regarded "info rmers," replete with allusions to
Judas Iscario t, the Book of Da ni el, schoolchildren's a bhorrence of
ta ttl eta les a nd folk ha tred of "stoolies" a nd "finks." Yet Navas ky
fina ll y has to admit tha t it is impossible to sepa ra te the mora lity of
informin g from e ither the content of the informa tion imparted or
from the na ture a nd a ims of both the pa rty whose secrets a re
revealed a nd the pa rty receiving them . Since no mora l issue survives
independent of these considera ti ons, the rhetoric a bout nobody
lov in g a n informer amounts to little more tha n mood music tipping
us off as to which side we should ta ke in the drama the author is
about to unfold. Yet Navas ky o ften overl ooks hi s own concessions
and adverts throu ghout the book to a bstrac t di squisiti ons about the
informer's betrayal of socia l tru st a nd the bonds of community,
buttressed with tidbits culled from prominent philosophers a nd
social scien ti sts.
