“Heroic? I was scared shitless! But my ego was at stake. My vanity. "Whaddya mean, I'm dumb?"”

— Studs Terkel

On his blacklisting in 1953
The Guardian interview (2002)
Context: A man comes from New York. He says, "These petitions, your name is on all of them: anti-poll tax, anti-lynching, friendship with the Soviet Union.... don't you know the communists were behind them?" And he said, "Look, you can get out of this pretty easy. All you got to do is say the communists duped you. You were dumb. You didn't mean it." I said, "But I did mean it!" To this day people say, "Oh, Studs, you were so heroic." Heroic? I was scared shitless! But my ego was at stake. My vanity. "Whaddya mean, I'm dumb?"

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Studs Terkel 19

American author, historian and broadcaster 1912–2008

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