despised. Veneration of the family isnpart of fascist aesthetics. Therefore,nveneration of the family is to benfeared and despised.nThe cautionary enthymeme becomes:nbe suspicious of those who veneratenfamily, since they are probably fascistsnat heart.nJixamining, even briefly, why PaulnGoodman and Walter Benjamin are thentwo greatest influences on her can sufficenfor a summary. Goodman is thenonly American writer, she admits, fromnwhom she learned anything, because hentried to do so many things equally well.nShe is astonished by the failure of hisncontemporaries to appreciate his beingnan “academic freeloader,” the giftednamateur who had the confidence tonthink he was so smart aboiit so manynthings. Not being recognized or rewardednfor what he was is especially poignantnfor one who, perhaps, anticipatesnthe same fate. Benjamin is importantnbecause “he didn’t like to read whatneverybody else was reading,” becausenhe was unable to do sustained work andnOn ChodorovnFugitive Essays: Selected Writingsnof Frank Chodorov; Edited bynCharles H. Hamilton; Liberty Press;nIndianapolis, Indiana.nby Charles MosernFrank Chodorov (1887-1966) willnbe remembered in American intellectualnhistory as an important formativeninfluence on certain currents withinnour politics. This volume, a convenientncollection of his writings drawn oftennfrom not-very-well-known publications,nprovides an excellent introduction tonDr. Moser is professor of Slavic at thenGeorge Washington University innWashington, D.C.nmade the essay his characteristic form,nand because he thought the “ethicalntask of the modern writer to be not ancreator but a destroyer—a destroyer ofnshallow inwardness, the consoling notionnof the universally human, dilettantishncreativity, and empty phrases.”nGoodman and Benjamin shared onencrucial critical idea: they took up armsnagainst what Sontag calls “the traditionalnenemy”—those who hold “receivednideas.” We all know what such codenwords signify. In an earlier essay shenwrote, “The most interesting ideas arenheresies.” The critical center of Sontagnshould now emerge with clarity for thenreader. Sontag has herself spelled it outnexactly enough. To perceive heresies asn”most interesting” without understandingnthat any heresy is merely a malformednslip-off section of orthodoxyncauses one to pursue finally the unimportant,nthe trivial. It leads necessarilynto measuring the truth by one’s selfnrather than the other way around.nAgainst such reckless ignorance the advicenof Saint Exupery’s aviator is wellnworth repeating: “Children, watch outnfor baobabs!” Dnhis thought.nPrefaced by a biography of Chodorovnby Charles Hamilton, the book is dividedninto a rather large number of sectionsn(11), each including from two tonseven essays. Some of the essays arenindividual chapters from his books, butnothers were short pieces published originallynin periodicals, most especiallynAnalysis, which he edited from 1944 ton1951; Human Events, with which henwas associated in its early years; andnNational Review, of which he was annassociate editor for a time. The collectionnalso includes a three-page selectednbibliography of his writings.nChodorov shared in a tradition ofnAmerican thought, although it was inneclipse at the time he wrote, and thatnnnfact distinctly tinged his point of view.nHe retreated into the past for some ofnhis intellectual heroes (Thomas Jefferson,nGeorge Mason, Henry Thoreau),nbut he likewise had intellectual alliesnmore of his own time: Henry Georgenand, especially, Albert Jay Nock, whomnhe knew personally and to whom he devotednmemorial essays after Nock’sndeath. Both he and Nock saw themselvesnas members of a small but intellectuallynpotent remnant-which upheldnthe old antistatist faith of individualism.nBut if Chodorov’s intellectual ancestrynwas a bit haphazard, toward thenend of his life he saw the contemporarynconservative movement begin to assumenform and substance, and several organizednentities remained after him, dedicatednto advancing certain ideas whichnhe shared—and this despite the fact thatnhe himself rejected political organizationnbecause, he said, it “serves only asna mask for those unable to think or unwillingnto act on their own convictions.”nSeveral organizations or clusters ofnorganizations may lay claim to all ornpart of Chodorov’s intellectual legacy,nand the divergent paths which thesenclusters are following in 1981 providenan interesting illustration of the fatenof ideas in politics. Chodorov was connectednin their early stages with a publicationnand an organization which stillnexist as pillars of traditional conservativenthought: the weekly Human Eventsnand the Intercollegiate Studies Instituten(ISI), originally formed as the IntercollegiatenSociety of Individualists in 1952.nThe impetus for the founding of ISIncame from an article of Chodorov’s,npublished around 1950, in which henenvisioned something along the linesnof a “lecture bureau” which would, innthe second half of the 20th century, advancenthe idea of individualism andnundo the work of collectivization whichnAmerican socialist organizations hadnaccomplished in its first half. He placednlittle confidence in professors as angroup: since the universities were insulatednfrom the discipline of the marketplace,nthey had every economic rea-nMay/Jttne 1981n