The Covert Sphere: Secrecy, Fiction, and the National Security State

by Timothy Melley

In this work, Timothy Melley proposes that since the Cold War, fiction has become integral to the growth of national security as a concept and to a transformation of democracy.

Genres: Politics, Nonfiction

304 pages, Paperback

First published October 23, 2012

Reviews

[Bernardo · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Covert Sphere: Secrecy, Fiction, and the National Security State, by Timothy Melley, professor of English at the Miami University, is rather underrated book. I came across it by accident, while researching for my PhD on US foreign policy. It consists of a thorough study of how fiction, since the beginning of the Cold War in the early 1950s, has become an essential factor for the development of the concept of national security. The emergence of the national security state in 1947 brought about an ever-growing web of clandestine organizations that aimed at hiding government actions, by means primarily of secrecy and deception, from the public sphere – what Melley calls the “covert sphere.” One of the results of official government secrecy is that certain forms of fiction became a key means through which Americans can “learn” – or imagine – about US foreign policy. Melley traces that relationship from the Korean War to the War on Terror, intertwining Cold War history with fascinating analysis of cinema, TV series and literature. “This transformation,” the author notes, “had a powerful role in fostering the forms of suspicion, scepticism, and uncertainty that would eventually find their fullest expression in postmodernism” (Melley 2012, p. viii). Melley argues that “the conditions of public knowledge under a regime of state secrecy generate forms of suspicion and unknowing uncannily similar to those typically associated with postmodern representation” (Melley 2012, p 29). The importance of Melley’s undertaking is that “state secrecy is a crucial part of a larger ideological system for managing the contradictions of U.S. empire. It makes a profound difference that the state conducts much of its foreign policy through covert institutions, particularly when people (here and abroad) know that the state is acting secretly, for they begin to suspect that all kinds of world events are being secretly orchestrated by covert agencies” (Melley 2012, 13).
The book is very academic, and as a result it can be difficult for the lay reader. But for anyone who is interested in popular culture – films such as The Manchurian Candidate and TV series such as 24 – and literature, including Margaret Atwood, Don DeLillo, Norman Mailer and others, or about the CIA and the covert world in general, and specifically the intersection of culture and the national security state, this is a must-read book, aligning smart literary criticism with insightful geopolitical and political analysis.

[Jukka Häkkinen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kiinnostava kirjaa pohdiskelee Yhdysvaltain tiedustelupalvelujen salaisen toiminnan, median ja viihteen suhdetta. Ajoittain on vaikeahkoa teoretisointia ja turhan pitkiä yksittäisten teosten juonien kuvauksia ja analyysejä.

[kellie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book. Though I'm not a postmodern buff, this book was an interesting comparison of the fictional state (or sphere) of national security. The parallels that run between the two are quite compelling and have sparked me to read The Public Burning and Libra as a result.