A CRYPTIC CHAPTER

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP75-00001R000400150002-6
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 15, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 14, 2003
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: October 4, 1966
• Content Type: NSPR

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WOLY, NEWS OCT 4 1966
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roe;riA~; le 2003/12/02 :CIA-RDP75-0001 R *0400150002-6
Cryptic
Chapter
BACK in 1958 "The Care of
Devils," a novel about the CIA
by Sylvia Press, was published
by Beacon Press. It got
absolutely nowhere. A
paperback addition has just been
published by Bantam. The
Bantam people had never heard
of the book until it was the
subject of a very, very late
review by Malcolm Muggeridge
in the May, 1966 issues of Es-
quire.
Miss Press used to be an
intelligence officer for the CIA.
She had been a CIA employee
for 12 years when she was fired
in 1954 after undergoing an
inquisition markedly similar to
the one inflicted upon the
heroine of "The Care of
Devils." Miss Press was in
Washington the other day on a
:promotion tour arranged by
Bantam (First printing: 150,000
copies.) In his Esquire review,
Malcolm Muggeridge suggested,
ever so delicately, that just
possibly the CIA might have
bought up that hard cover
edition in 1958, which was why
it "disappeared" from the
bookstores. Miss Press said that
naturally she was heartbroken
when her book seemed such a
failure, but she figured that its
"disappearance" was due to
''.the ineptness of the
,publishers." She said, "It never
occured to me in all these years
that the CIA bought it off the
shelves."
I asked Miss Press what
evidence there was to show that
the CIA had actually done such
a thing, and she conceded that
the evidence wasn't exactly air-
tight. "Esquire was planning
this issue of espionage and
sex," she said, "and a man
very high up in Washington told
the editor that he ought to get
a copy of my book, and that the
CIA had suppressed it."
Miss Press has no clue to the
identity of this Government big
wing. "I don't even know the
gender," she said.
published in Italy, but Miss
Press never found out who had
arranged for THAT, and she
never got a penny out of the
cleat. I said, "Didn't you have
an agent?" Miss Press said,
"Yes, but I didn't.want to keep
pestering her because I knew
she wasn't making any money
on me." In 1959 the book was:
published in England, where it
escaped the attention of
Malcolm Muggeridge. Miss
Press said she (lid get an
advance from the English
publisher, and she read some of
the English reviews in the
periodical section of the public
library. They were favorable.
she said.
Miss Press said that she had::
just been commended for a'
special report written for her'
CIA bosses when she was,
without warning, subjected to
"a nightmare" of questioning.
"I was never directly accused
of anything," she said, and I
never got a straight answer to
any question I asked THEM. I
even took a lie detector test.
That machine went wild. I was
a nervous wreck by that time.
They asked me questions about
every little thing for years back.
The results seemed to show that
I had given up Communism at
the age of 10! I said to the man
who was running the tests, 'At
least it shows I was one of the
earliest disillusioned ones.' I
don't know how I managed to
keep a little of my sense of
humor ..."
The episode was straight out
of Kafka, Miss Press says, and
she doesn't know to this day if
the CIA got her confused with
somebody else, or if she ways'
being offered up as a sacrifice.
to McCarthyism. "They could
have been playing the numbers
game," Miss Press said. "They
might have told him, 'See, we're
cleaning our own house.' "
"In spite of everything, I'm
still in favor of security," Miss.
Press said. "I don't feel
vindictive about the CIA. After
all, the CIA is my own
government. I made the original
publishers agree not to use the
name CIA. I feel the real villain
is fear ... I wrote the book as
Appr eForRelo er2GO912J02-e>t A*RDP?6'000048000400150002-6
weren't enough to cover my maybe the CLA is a different
Advance." The book was organisation now , .
Miss Press ?aid she never got
any royalties from that first
publication of hok: "The