The untold story of the academics who became OSS spies invented modern spycraft and helped
turn the tide of the war At the start of WWII the U.S. found itself in desperate need of an
intelligence agency. The Office of Strategic Services (OSS) a precursor to today’s CIA was
quickly formed—and in an effort to fill its ranks with experts the OSS turned to academia for
recruits. Suddenly literature professors librarians and historians were training to perform
undercover operations and investigative work—and these surprising spies would go on to
profoundly shape both the course of the war and our cultural institutions with their efforts.
In Book and Dagger Elyse Graham draws on personal histories letters and declassified OSS
files to tell the story of a small but connected group of humanities scholars turned spies.
Among them are Joseph Curtiss a literature professor who hunted down German spies and turned
them into double agents Sherman Kent a smart-mouthed history professor who rose to become the
head of analysis for all of Europe and Africa and Adele Kibre an archivist who was sent to
Stockholm to secretly acquire documents for the OSS. These unforgettable characters would
ultimately help lay the foundations of modern intelligence and transform American higher
education when they returned after the war. Thrillingly paced and rigorously researched Book
and Dagger is an inspiring and gripping true story about a group of academics who helped beat
the Nazis—a tale that reveals the indelible power of the humanities to change the world.
