Robin Winks pseudonym?

Robin William Winks

(American writer, 1930-2003)

Also known as: Robin W. Winks, Robin William Evert Winks

Robin William Winks, a history professor at Yale University and John B. Madden Master of Berkeley College, has written numerous books concerning his field, several of which discuss such subjects as Canadian history and slavery. More recently, however, he has garnered attention from critics for his writings about detective fiction and real-life espionage. One of these publications, Modus Operandi: An Excursion into Detective Fiction, in which Winks defends the mystery genre as a legitimate form of literature, has been called "one of the most intriguing and satisfying books on the crime field to come along in years" by one Detroit News critic. Part of the effectiveness in Winks's writing is due to his approach, say several reviewers. Washington Post Book World contributor Michael Dirda, for example, explains that "Winks downplays the puzzle aspect of detective fiction--he has no use for locked-room problems--and emphasizes the social dimension. The mystery illuminates a country, a society, a time, ultimately makes us rethink our values and examine our character."

Winks's interest in detective fiction led him to write his more recent book, Cloak and Gown: Scholars in the Secret War. "I wanted to write something factual, " he tells Michael Freitag in the New York Times Book Review, "something that would help me to see to what extent the fiction had any basis in reality." In Cloak and Gown Winks proves that the idea that academics were never involved in espionage is erroneous. "Winks explodes this purer-than-thou theory completely with example after example of how the universities came to the aid of the nation both in public and in secret during time of threat, " writes Washington Post Book World critic Duncan Spencer. Specifically, the historian focuses on the professors and graduates of Yale University, including such figures of the Office of Strategic Services (the forerunner of the Central Intelligence Agency) as James Angleton, Donald Downes, Joseph Toy Curtiss, and Norman Pearson.

Although Nation reviewer Jon Wiener agrees that Winks's book provides "irrefutable evidence that Yale has been entwined in the C.I.A. for decades, " he feels that the author fails to thoroughly address his two main questions: "whether there is American imperialism, and whether the C.I.A.'s effort to give historical scholarship a 'social utility' compromised the discipline." Other critics, however, believe that Cloak and Gown provides valuable information for the reader who is interested in the history of the C.I.A. "Cloak and Gown is not only an entertaining contribution to the secret history of the 1940's and 50's, " asserts Godfrey Hodgson in the New York Times Book Review, "it is also an important one." Spencer similarly remarks, "This is a book of deep research and fresh views."