Beat the Devil (novel)

Beat the Devil is a 1951 thriller written by Claud Cockburn under the pseudonym James Helvick.

[1] Cockburn used the pseudonym, though he had left the British Communist Party in 1947, he was still considered a "Red" during the early years of the Cold War, which was rife with anti-communist sentiment.

Beat the Devil was Cockburn's first novel, and the first work of fiction that the long-time political journalist had written since the 1920s.

Beat the Devil was made into a 1953 film by director John Huston, who paid Cockburn £3,000 for the rights to the book and screenplay.

Cockburn collaborated with Huston on the early drafts of the script, but the credit went to Truman Capote.