[Earlier this
year, I belatedly but excitedly got into The Americans, the FX drama about
two KGB agents (the great Keri
Russell and Matthew Rhys) living in deep cover as a married couple in
Reagan’s 1980s America. It’s a wonderful and very AmericanStudies show, so this
week I’ll AmericanStudy five issues and themes to which the show connects.
Leading up to my latest Guest Post on another set of pop culture texts and
questions!]
On what we don’t
know about two high-profile spying controversies—and why it doesn’t matter.
While the
protagonists of The Americans were
born in Russia, many of the Soviet spies with whom they work in the course of
the show are native-born Americans who have been “turned” and are now spying on
behalf of the USSR. 20th century history offers a number of
prominent examples of such spies, but in most cases the evidence remains murky
at best, and thus produces more questions than answers about these cases and
what we make of them. Few examples better illustrate the stakes of such historical
interpretations and analyses than the cases of Alger Hiss and Julius
and Ethel Rosenberg. At one extreme—but, to be clear, an extreme that could
be argued within the bounds of serious historical inquiry—each case could be
seen as at least a partial vindication of McCarthyism,
as evidence that communist spies and sympathizers were indeed operating within
the U.S. government and society. At the other, equally arguable extreme, these
three Americans embody the worst of that era, and particularly its persecution
and destruction of innocent lives in service of paranoia, fear, and the
creation at all costs of the “us vs. them” mentality about which I wrote in
Monday’s post.
Perhaps in time
sufficient evidence will be unearthed or released that historians will be able
to come to more conclusive perspectives on one or both of these prominent cases—although
so far key details have not only remained
secret but also have been legally
reinforced in that state. To date, at least as far as this AmericanStudier
understands it (and as I
analyzed from a different angle in this post), the available evidence seems
to implicate Julius Rosenberg as a Soviet spy, to cast serious doubt on the
guilt of his wife Ethel, and to remain entirely inconclusive when it comes to Alger
Hiss. Yet while the guilt and innocence of these individuals are no small
matters—not least because the
Rosenbergs were executed for their alleged crimes, while Hiss lived the remaining
forty-five years of his life under the cloud of suspicion as well—it’s also
possible, and important, to analyze the cases in other contexts regardless of
such ambiguities, to consider what these histories and lives can reveal even if
their deepest secrets might never see the light of day.
To my mind, one
clear and important way to consider all three accused spies is to recognize the
range of American identities and experiences to which they connect: Julius for
example as the son of Jewish immigrants who settled in New York’s
East Side neighborhoods; Ethel for another example as a New York New Woman
who initially pursued a career as an actress and singer before moving into
those iconic
mid-20th century roles of wife, mother, and homemaker; Hiss for
a third example as the
product of a declining Maryland family, surrounded by tragedies including
his father’s and sister’s suicides, who worked his way to Harvard and a
prestigious career in law and politics. Which is to say, whether they spied or
not, whether they were traitors or victims, these are American stories and
histories and identities, lives and worlds no less (and no more) a part of our
national narratives than those of Joseph McCarthy, Richard Nixon, J. Edgar
Hoover, and their other accusers and adversaries—or, The Americans would argue and I would agree, than the American
stories of spies like Elizabeth and Philip Jennings. Whatever the truth, the
simple fact is that there’s no us vs. them—it’s all us.
Next
AmericansStudying tomorrow,
Ben
PS. What do you
think? Other AmericanStudies shows you’d highlight?
