What do you think?
Rate this book
The Time of the Toad: A Study of Inquisition in America, and Two Related Pamphlets
The Time of the Toad is a searing classic about political repression in America by the legendary screenwriter Dalton Trumbo. In the early 1940s, Trumbo and many other artists, writers, and intellectuals who shared anti-war sympathies and anti-fascist ideals were active members of the American communist party, but their ideology did not go unnoticed. In 1947, during the era of Joseph McCarthy and the “Red Scare” in America, he and nine other Hollywood screenwriters (the “Hollywood Ten”), were called to testify before the U.S. government’s House Committee on Un-American Activities Commission. Trumbo and others who refused to cooperate were charged with contempt; he later served nearly a year in prison and was blacklisted as a screenwriter for the following decade. The Time of the Toad explores both the contempt citations and the greater philosophical issues they raised for the nation. The toad of the title is in reference to an 1890s article by Émile Zola in which the animal in question serves as a rhetorical metaphor for how to survive living in a repressive socio-political environment. Zola suggested that you have to swallow a live toad each day to immunize yourself to the moral indifference of the society around you. The analogy was as apt during Trumbo’s time in the mid-twentieth century, and unfortunately is still relevant and meaningful. The Time of the Toad remains a powerful testament to the courage of Trumbo’s principled stand, and a timeless treatise on the value of free speech and thought. Readers interested in related titles from Dalton Trumbo will also want to Eclipse ( 1635610982), Eclipse ( 1635610982), Eclipse ( 1635610982 ).
174 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1949
10 people are currently reading
187 people want to read
About the author
Dalton Trumbo
32 books707 followersDalton Trumbo worked as a cub reporter for the Grand Junction Daily Sentinel, covering courts, the high school, the mortuary and civic organizations. He attended the University of Colorado for two years working as a reporter for the Boulder Daily Camera and contributing to the campus humor magazine, the yearbook and the campus newspaper. He got his start working for Vogue magazine. His first published novel, Eclipse, was about a town and its people, written in the social realist style, and drew on his years in Grand Junction. He started writing for movies in 1937; by the 1940s, he was one of Hollywood's highest paid writers for work on such films as Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo (1944), and Our Vines Have Tender Grapes (1945), and Kitty Foyle (1940), for which he was nominated for an Academy Award for Writing Adapted Screenplay.
Trumbo's 1939 anti-war novel, Johnny Got His Gun, won a National Book Award (then known as an American Book Sellers Award) that year. The novel was inspired by an article Trumbo read about a soldier who was horribly disfigured during World War I.
In 1947, Trumbo, along with nine other writers and directors, was called before the House Un-American Activities Committee as an unfriendly witness to testify on the presence of communist influence in Hollywood. Trumbo refused to give information. After conviction for contempt of Congress, he was blacklisted, and in 1950, spent 11 months in prison in the federal penitentiary in Ashland, KY. Once released, he moved to Mexico.
In 1993, Trumbo was awarded the Academy Award posthumously for writing Roman Holiday (1953). The screen credit and award were previously given to Ian McLellan Hunter, who had been acting as a "front" for Trumbo since he had been blacklisted by Hollywood.
Trumbo's 1939 anti-war novel, Johnny Got His Gun, won a National Book Award (then known as an American Book Sellers Award) that year. The novel was inspired by an article Trumbo read about a soldier who was horribly disfigured during World War I.
In 1947, Trumbo, along with nine other writers and directors, was called before the House Un-American Activities Committee as an unfriendly witness to testify on the presence of communist influence in Hollywood. Trumbo refused to give information. After conviction for contempt of Congress, he was blacklisted, and in 1950, spent 11 months in prison in the federal penitentiary in Ashland, KY. Once released, he moved to Mexico.
In 1993, Trumbo was awarded the Academy Award posthumously for writing Roman Holiday (1953). The screen credit and award were previously given to Ian McLellan Hunter, who had been acting as a "front" for Trumbo since he had been blacklisted by Hollywood.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
May 8, 2022
The title is definitive as to the content of this book: “The Time of the Toad” by Dalton Trumbo: A Study of Inquisition in America by One of the Hollywood Ten.
First printed in 1949 my copy is a hardback printed in 2011.
If you are a movie buff, if you love classic movies, you know the name TRUMBO. Screenwriter of award winning movies ("Roman Holiday") even as he was one of the most famous (or infamous) writers blacklisted during the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) created in 1938.
Accused of being a Communist Trumbo refused to answer questions as they were put to him by the Committee and served a prison term for his refusal.
In these pages Trumbo discusses the HUAC and its activities.
Regardless of when this was written I found it eminently interesting reading in today’s climate.
First printed in 1949 my copy is a hardback printed in 2011.
If you are a movie buff, if you love classic movies, you know the name TRUMBO. Screenwriter of award winning movies ("Roman Holiday") even as he was one of the most famous (or infamous) writers blacklisted during the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) created in 1938.
Accused of being a Communist Trumbo refused to answer questions as they were put to him by the Committee and served a prison term for his refusal.
In these pages Trumbo discusses the HUAC and its activities.
Regardless of when this was written I found it eminently interesting reading in today’s climate.
January 2, 2019
How I came to read this book
I first heard the word "McCarthyism" from an aunt way back in the early 1980's. She was a history major from the Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi, and a liberal. I was in my late teens then; India had just recovered from Indira Gandhi's Emergency (1975-77) and slowly moving towards the right of the political spectrum. As a staunch leftist, I was outraged that freedom of expression could be curbed like that. But it was an old story, and the nightmare of the Emergency was past, so I filed away the knowledge as a historical curiosity and forgot all about it.
I was reminded of it again while reading The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver in 2010. Now with the help of Wikipedia and other sources, I could do a bit of research and what came up was appalling: I could really understand the meaning of "witch hunt". And with India inexorably moving towards the right, it was a frightening reminder of what could happen.
Fast forward to 2014. I read and reviewed Eminent Historians: Their Technology, Their Line, Their Fraud by Arun Shourie, which puts forward the conspiracy theory that all reputed Indian historians are communists and have massively distorted India's "true" history - which is, of course, pure bovine excrement - and I said as much in my review. A disgruntled right-winger commented that I was purposefully shutting my eyes and pointed me to an interview by Yuri Bezmonov - a Soviet defector - as conclusive proof that the Indian intelligentsia were compromised.
Well, I read the book written by that guy too (Love Letter to America) and found the same sort of wild allegations without a shred of proof. The matter should have rested there, had not the Indian government started its own witch-hunt for "Urban Naxals", based on Vivek Agnihotri's book of the same name. Soon, the right-wingers all over India were discovering "Maoists" around every corner. And increasingly, intellectuals in academia and entertainment were being targeted.
McCarthyism had been revived in India with a vengeance.
The Review
In the late 1940’s, the USA went mad. Due to the heightening of tensions because of the Cold War with the Soviet Union, the government began seeing a communist infiltrator under each bed and across every corner. Hundreds of people were hounded out of their careers and lost their livelihood due to governmental persecution.
The most infamous of the institutions created as a tool for this “inquisition” was the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC).
One of the main contributions of the committee to the anti-communist witch-hunt was its enquiry into the Hollywood film industry. Over a period of nine days, it examined witnesses from industry and compelled them to reveal their ties to the American Communist Party. Ten of them refused, citing the Fifth Amendment to the constitution, which protected a citizen from giving self-incriminatory evidence. These ten people were convicted of contempt of Congress charges, and ultimately fined and jailed – even though they had done nothing illegal (even the Communist party was a legal organisation). And around 300 people were blacklisted and lost their careers.
Dalton Trumbo, screenwriter and novelist, was one of them. And this essay is his indictment of this state-sponsored terrorism. It talks about the freedoms which are sacrosanct in a democracy, and how they were being crushed by the current administration. Even though Trumbo’s voice comes to us from seven decades ago, it’s worth listening to.
Trumbo calls the particular time period “the time of the toad”, after Emile Zola’s quip to a young writer on how to stomach absolutely unpalatable and jingoistic newspaper columns: eat a toad, alive and whole. It will settle the stomach to such an extent that it can digest anything!
Nation-states are artificial constructs. And governments, in times of insecurity, creative a narrative of Us vs Them – the so-called “patriots” vs “traitors”. It is an example of the “in-group” against the “out-group”, as explained by Desmond Morris in 'The Human Zoo'. The in-group may be the majority religion, race or believers of a particular political philosophy. The out-group is usually an underprivileged minority, who are seen as the cause of all the troubles plaguing the in-group and the nation.
The obvious example near at hand, for Trumbo, is Nazi Germany: after going through its recent history in brief, he suddenly shifts to USA and the House Committee for Un-American Activities, as a worthy successor to Nazi-era repressive fora. However, here there is the additional feature of an “enemy nation” the “traitorous” out-group is loyal to: the Soviet Union.
Once such an out-group is identified, it’s child’s play for the authorities to terrorise the populace into submission. Most people are not willing to sacrifice their lives for the truth. You put the fear of reprisals into people: and to escape, they will point their finger at anyone other than themselves.
He details the acts of the committee, and how person after person chickened out and agreed to testify, and squeal on their colleagues. It makes compelling reading – because this is what happens everywhere, right from the original witch hunts in Europe to the modern-day totalitarian regimes.
As the persecution goes on, studio bosses and union leaders use it as an opportunity to settle old scores, break strikes and gain political advantage. Soon, it is the situation where any form of expression not expressly sanctioned by the administration becomes a “thought crime” (Orwell was writing about communism, but his metaphor works for the right as well): because, freedom of expression can never be partial, as expressed by Mr. Benjamin De Voto, writing in the September 1949, issue of Harper's Magazine, about the committee’s attempt to police universities:
For any supporter of free thought, this is almost a tautology – but those who want to impose the will of the state on its citizens, freedom of expression is anathema.
***
Trumbo’s dire warning that the American movie industry will follow the German one, where films were only used as fascist propaganda, didn’t come true, fortunately. But the poison injected into the minds of the common man remained as distrust of any viewpoint questioning the status quo. And of late, it has re-emerged as censorship and gagging of academics and intellectuals across an increasingly right-leaning world.
The world as a whole – including my country, India – is going through the Time of the Toad. People are not just eating the toad; they are swallowing it whole and declaring it the tastiest food ever. In this situation, we cannot hope any state institution to give us succour: because for them to exist, toad-eating is mandatory.
The only thing to do is refuse to eat the toad. Shout out loud from the rooftops. Make your voice heard. If the voices are sufficient in number, it will breach any wall.
REFUSE TO EAT THE TOAD.
I first heard the word "McCarthyism" from an aunt way back in the early 1980's. She was a history major from the Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi, and a liberal. I was in my late teens then; India had just recovered from Indira Gandhi's Emergency (1975-77) and slowly moving towards the right of the political spectrum. As a staunch leftist, I was outraged that freedom of expression could be curbed like that. But it was an old story, and the nightmare of the Emergency was past, so I filed away the knowledge as a historical curiosity and forgot all about it.
I was reminded of it again while reading The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver in 2010. Now with the help of Wikipedia and other sources, I could do a bit of research and what came up was appalling: I could really understand the meaning of "witch hunt". And with India inexorably moving towards the right, it was a frightening reminder of what could happen.
Fast forward to 2014. I read and reviewed Eminent Historians: Their Technology, Their Line, Their Fraud by Arun Shourie, which puts forward the conspiracy theory that all reputed Indian historians are communists and have massively distorted India's "true" history - which is, of course, pure bovine excrement - and I said as much in my review. A disgruntled right-winger commented that I was purposefully shutting my eyes and pointed me to an interview by Yuri Bezmonov - a Soviet defector - as conclusive proof that the Indian intelligentsia were compromised.
Well, I read the book written by that guy too (Love Letter to America) and found the same sort of wild allegations without a shred of proof. The matter should have rested there, had not the Indian government started its own witch-hunt for "Urban Naxals", based on Vivek Agnihotri's book of the same name. Soon, the right-wingers all over India were discovering "Maoists" around every corner. And increasingly, intellectuals in academia and entertainment were being targeted.
McCarthyism had been revived in India with a vengeance.
The Review
McCarthyism is the practice in the United States of making accusations of subversion or treason without proper regard for evidence. The term refers to U.S. senator Joseph McCarthy (R-Wisconsin) and has its origins in the period in the United States known as the Second Red Scare, lasting from the late 1940s through the 1950s. It was characterized by heightened political repression as well as a campaign spreading fear of Communist influence on American institutions and of espionage by Soviet agents. – Wikipedia
In the late 1940’s, the USA went mad. Due to the heightening of tensions because of the Cold War with the Soviet Union, the government began seeing a communist infiltrator under each bed and across every corner. Hundreds of people were hounded out of their careers and lost their livelihood due to governmental persecution.
The most infamous of the institutions created as a tool for this “inquisition” was the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC).
The House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC, or House Committee on Un-American Activities, or HCUA) was an investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives. The HUAC was created in 1938 to investigate alleged disloyalty and subversive activities on the part of private citizens, public employees, and those organizations suspected of having Fascist or Communist ties. – Wikipedia
One of the main contributions of the committee to the anti-communist witch-hunt was its enquiry into the Hollywood film industry. Over a period of nine days, it examined witnesses from industry and compelled them to reveal their ties to the American Communist Party. Ten of them refused, citing the Fifth Amendment to the constitution, which protected a citizen from giving self-incriminatory evidence. These ten people were convicted of contempt of Congress charges, and ultimately fined and jailed – even though they had done nothing illegal (even the Communist party was a legal organisation). And around 300 people were blacklisted and lost their careers.
Dalton Trumbo, screenwriter and novelist, was one of them. And this essay is his indictment of this state-sponsored terrorism. It talks about the freedoms which are sacrosanct in a democracy, and how they were being crushed by the current administration. Even though Trumbo’s voice comes to us from seven decades ago, it’s worth listening to.
Trumbo calls the particular time period “the time of the toad”, after Emile Zola’s quip to a young writer on how to stomach absolutely unpalatable and jingoistic newspaper columns: eat a toad, alive and whole. It will settle the stomach to such an extent that it can digest anything!
All nations in the course of their histories have passed through periods which, to extend Zola's figure of speech, might be called the Time of the Toad: an epoch long or short as the temper of the people may permit, fatal or merely debilitating as the vitality of the people may determine, In which the nation turns upon Itself in a kind of compulsive madness to deny all In its tradition that is clean, to exalt all that is vile, and to destroy any heretical minority which asserts toad-meat not to be the delicacy which governmental edict declares it. Triple heralds of the Time of the Toad are the loyalty oath, the compulsory revelation of faith, and the secret police.
Nation-states are artificial constructs. And governments, in times of insecurity, creative a narrative of Us vs Them – the so-called “patriots” vs “traitors”. It is an example of the “in-group” against the “out-group”, as explained by Desmond Morris in 'The Human Zoo'. The in-group may be the majority religion, race or believers of a particular political philosophy. The out-group is usually an underprivileged minority, who are seen as the cause of all the troubles plaguing the in-group and the nation.
The obvious example near at hand, for Trumbo, is Nazi Germany: after going through its recent history in brief, he suddenly shifts to USA and the House Committee for Un-American Activities, as a worthy successor to Nazi-era repressive fora. However, here there is the additional feature of an “enemy nation” the “traitorous” out-group is loyal to: the Soviet Union.
Once such an out-group is identified, it’s child’s play for the authorities to terrorise the populace into submission. Most people are not willing to sacrifice their lives for the truth. You put the fear of reprisals into people: and to escape, they will point their finger at anyone other than themselves.
He details the acts of the committee, and how person after person chickened out and agreed to testify, and squeal on their colleagues. It makes compelling reading – because this is what happens everywhere, right from the original witch hunts in Europe to the modern-day totalitarian regimes.
If a man Is a Communist and denies his affiliation More the committee, he has committed perjury and he will go to jail. if he answers affirmatively, the second question put to him will be “Who else?" If he refuses this answer he is in contempt in the same degree as if he had refused the first, and he will go to jail. If he answers the second, he will be confronted with the third: “Who are your relatives? Your friends? Your business associates? Your acquaintances?" At which point, if he complies, he is involved in such a nauseous quagmire of betrayal that no man, however sympathetic to his predicament, can view him without loathing.
As the persecution goes on, studio bosses and union leaders use it as an opportunity to settle old scores, break strikes and gain political advantage. Soon, it is the situation where any form of expression not expressly sanctioned by the administration becomes a “thought crime” (Orwell was writing about communism, but his metaphor works for the right as well): because, freedom of expression can never be partial, as expressed by Mr. Benjamin De Voto, writing in the September 1949, issue of Harper's Magazine, about the committee’s attempt to police universities:
“There is no such thing as academic freedom that is just a mite restricted, The colleges are entirely free or they are not free at all.”
For any supporter of free thought, this is almost a tautology – but those who want to impose the will of the state on its citizens, freedom of expression is anathema.
***
Trumbo’s dire warning that the American movie industry will follow the German one, where films were only used as fascist propaganda, didn’t come true, fortunately. But the poison injected into the minds of the common man remained as distrust of any viewpoint questioning the status quo. And of late, it has re-emerged as censorship and gagging of academics and intellectuals across an increasingly right-leaning world.
Education, hitherto presumed to consist of free inquiry into the nature of truth, thus becomes merely an "instrument" of whatever policy the nation momentarily may pursue. That policy, determined outside the university and being on its own ipse dixit right, obviously cannot be subject to free inquiry. When policy has been made, inquiry ceases. National policy is truth, truth is national policy. It cannot be otherwise.(Sounds chillingly familiar, doesn’t it?)
The world as a whole – including my country, India – is going through the Time of the Toad. People are not just eating the toad; they are swallowing it whole and declaring it the tastiest food ever. In this situation, we cannot hope any state institution to give us succour: because for them to exist, toad-eating is mandatory.
The only thing to do is refuse to eat the toad. Shout out loud from the rooftops. Make your voice heard. If the voices are sufficient in number, it will breach any wall.
REFUSE TO EAT THE TOAD.
Read
November 4, 2010A chilling tale of the anti-Communist hysteria of the mid-twentieth century by one of its targets. A reminder that it could, and in fact has, happened again.
September 22, 2025
Although the first pamphlet was written in 1949, in response to the activities of the House Unamerican Activities Committee (HUAC) and its efforts to root out communists and communist sympathizers, and impose loyalty tests upon American citizens, and the second one was written in 1956 in response to the prosecution of people for being members or sympathizers of the communist party, they remain extremely relevant today. In the present era the descendants of the HUAC and the jurists who prosecuted them are once again seeking to establish tests to determine who is a true-blue faithful devoted American who toes the line and parrots the propaganda disseminated by those in leadership positions while intimidating, blacklisting and, in some instances, bankrupting and imprisoning those who dare to oppose them by word or deed. These pamphlets provide guidance concerning the trials and tribulations that anyone who has the courage to standup for what is right, ie, the freedoms guaranteed by the US Constitution, may face and endure.
The third writing, a magazine article published in 1965, also remains exceedingly relevant. In a satirical manner it discusses what may happen if people are silent and complacent, as they were when faced with the threats posed by the HUAC and others. It is prescient with respect to the dangers posed by the current administration in Washington to American democracy, and the challenges facing American citizens seeking to make their voices heard, and oppose the administration’s actions.
The third writing, a magazine article published in 1965, also remains exceedingly relevant. In a satirical manner it discusses what may happen if people are silent and complacent, as they were when faced with the threats posed by the HUAC and others. It is prescient with respect to the dangers posed by the current administration in Washington to American democracy, and the challenges facing American citizens seeking to make their voices heard, and oppose the administration’s actions.
June 6, 2018
Trumbo's book on McCarthyism and the accompanying attacks on artists and others. Mostly it describes the reasons he felt the trials to be non-democratic and to be violations of law. Interesting to read in the Trump era, when once again the American legal system is under attack by politicians who are supposed to be defending it.
October 10, 2017
El tiempo del sapo es un alegato a la libertad de expresión, de creación y de asociación, en unos tiempos donde, frente al miedo, los gobiernos optan por la represión de cualquier idea innovadora o que se salga de sus expectativas
March 11, 2013
Ocurrió en 1956, la glamurosa Deborah Kerr subió al estrado muy dispuesta y pronunció aquello de “and the Oscar goes to…”. En juego estaba el galardón al mejor guión y el aforturnado resultó ser un tal Robert Rich. Tras los aplausos de rigor, los estilosos asistentes miraban incrédulos a su alrededor en busca del misterioso guionista. Finalmente tuvo que ser un representante del sindicato de guionistas el encargado de recoger la estatuilla en nombre de Rich, quien al parecer se encontraba en el hospital apunto de ser padre. Falso de toda falsedad, que diría aquel.
Como se descubrió más tarde, el autor se encontraba exiliado en el DF donde tuvo que emigrar a verlas venir, previo paso por una prisión federal por tiempo de un año. Robert Rich resultó ser el seudónimo de Dalton Trumbo, uno de los más exitosos guionistas de la época dorada de Hollywood, cuyo delito fue negarse a confesar sus filiaciones políticas en 1947 ante el Comité de Actividades Antiamericanas.
Lee el resto de la reseña en http://blogs.publico.es/j-losa/2013/0...
Como se descubrió más tarde, el autor se encontraba exiliado en el DF donde tuvo que emigrar a verlas venir, previo paso por una prisión federal por tiempo de un año. Robert Rich resultó ser el seudónimo de Dalton Trumbo, uno de los más exitosos guionistas de la época dorada de Hollywood, cuyo delito fue negarse a confesar sus filiaciones políticas en 1947 ante el Comité de Actividades Antiamericanas.
Lee el resto de la reseña en http://blogs.publico.es/j-losa/2013/0...
Want to read
February 14, 2016Saw a biography on PBS about him. Very intellectual wordsmith.
April 26, 2017
Though Trumbo was a great screenwriter, he's not quite in the class of Gore Vidal or a John Kenneth Galbraith when it comes to writing essays. Thus, 4-stars instead of 5 as the content of these essays was on a par with the aforementioned.
Dalton Trumbo was one of the Hollywood 10 and one of my heroes because of being a member of that illustrious group.
Richard Nixon and his fellow witch hunters on The House of Unamerican Activities shamed our country and its heritage with their attacks on their fellow-citizens' freedoms.
They damaged the lives, families, and wealth of so many whilst they were causing the weakest amongst us to cower in fear that we would be next.
Then, we rewarded this man's behavior by forgetting it when we elected his President of the United States.
For those who wish to view instead of reading, I recommend The Hollywood 10 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hol...), The Front and Guilty By Suspicion.
Dalton Trumbo was one of the Hollywood 10 and one of my heroes because of being a member of that illustrious group.
Richard Nixon and his fellow witch hunters on The House of Unamerican Activities shamed our country and its heritage with their attacks on their fellow-citizens' freedoms.
They damaged the lives, families, and wealth of so many whilst they were causing the weakest amongst us to cower in fear that we would be next.
Then, we rewarded this man's behavior by forgetting it when we elected his President of the United States.
For those who wish to view instead of reading, I recommend The Hollywood 10 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hol...), The Front and Guilty By Suspicion.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews