And Then They Loved Him: Seward Collins and the Chimera of an American Fascism

by Michael Jay Tucker

In Jazz Age America and Europe few stars burned brighter than Seward Collins, who seemingly had it all – money, breeding, good looks, and literary talent. His friends included Fitzgerald, Dreiser, Mencken, and Hemingway, while among his lovers was Dorothy Parker. Yet, in the 1930s, this glittering creature would announce that he was a «Fascist». This book, useful for any study of the American Jazz Age or world Fascism, explores Collins’ curious story, and asks if there might be a Fascist tradition in America, as much a part of the nation as Flag Day and apple pie.

206 pages, Hardcover

First published December 30, 2005

Reviews

[Matthew W · Rating 5 out of 5]

"And Then They Loved Him" is basically a history of American politics and intellectualism during the 1920s-1940s with Seward Collins as the central subject. Basically, Collins was one of the few mainstream and "credible" fascists in America, but in a peculiar sense. He was mainly a Distributist (a fan of people like Hilaire Belloc) , but with fascist sympathizes/tendencies. Seward Collins hailed Mussolini as a hero, but he was never really a supporter of National Socialism.

Seward Collins knew a variety of popular intellectual from the 1920s including Scott Fitzgerald, H.L. Mencken (the first guy to promote and translate Nietzsche's work into English in the United States), Dorothy Parker (1/2 Jewish writer Collins dated), Ernst Hemingway, Theodore Dreiser, and pretty much any other important intellectual/writer of that time. Oddly enough, he was at one point friends with Walter Winchell, a Jewish gossip columnist who wrote derogatory things about Germans, describing them as "Huns." Winchell also worked with the ADL and spied on people (including Collins), giving private information about suspected "fascists" to the FBI.

As for Collins, he is best known today for owning/editing two literary journals: "The Bookman" and "The American Review." In these journals, Collins promoted fascist, nationalist, right-wing, and Southern Agrarians ideas (promoters of Southern culture and traditional living). I also recommend looking into the works of Southern Agrarians intellectuals Richard M. Weaver and Donald Davidson. Basically, Southern Agrarians are the Southern American equivalent of Radical Traditionalists.

Anyways, I highly recommend this book if you're interested in learning the intellectual/political climate of America from 1920s-1940s. Before reading the book, I knew nothing about Southern Agrarians.