Joel Whitney has done a lot of research on the CIA's remarkable involvement with writers and artists. His book on it is https://www.amazon.com/Finks-C-I-Tricked-Worlds-Writers/dp/1.... There are good interviews with him about it online. It's amazing how extensive these involvements were and how major the writers were.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10116113 from 2015 is on this topic, but not that great a thread.