"It Will Be a Long Time, I Imagine, Before a Better Account of Art and Thought in Mid-Twentieth-Century America Appears"

"The Free World does not have a single, comprehensive argument; it contains many disparate arguments, only a few of which I've touched on here. It is based on a vast amount of research, biographical, historical, even economic, which shows (though it doesn't obtrude—Menand is too graceful a writer for that). Though he has not overcome my skepticism about some of the artistic and cultural developments of the period, he has nevertheless taught me a good deal."

George Scialabba at The Baffler reviews Louis Menand's The Free World: Art and Thought in the Cold War.