The problem was that Matthews clearly became smitten for Castro, whom he viewed as one of history's great men. This blinded him to Castro's faults. For example, even after Castro admitted publicly in 1960 that he was and always had been a Communist, Matthews continued to deny it. To his death in 1977, Matthews maintained that Castro was not a Communist at the time of his interview, but only became one subsequently due to mistaken American policy.

 Even when Castro began slaughtering his enemies by the hundreds, after overthrowing Batista in 1959, Matthews defended him. In a Jan. 18, 1959 news story in the Times, Matthews wrote that Castro was "by any standard a man of destiny." To criticize him, Matthews said, one must criticize all Cubans, "as there are very few Cubans indeed who would disapprove of the executions that have been and are taking place."

 The mass murders were justified, Matthews said, because Cuba had just "lived through the most brutal reign of terror in recent history." To be sure, Batista was a bad guy. But calling his regime the most brutal in recent history was extraordinary hyperbole, given that the genocides of Adolph Hitler and Josef Stalin were still fresh memories.

 Once Castro came out of the closet, so to speak, and admitted he was a Communist, Matthews came under severe attack. His uncritical reportage -- not to mention the many supportive editorials he wrote for the Times -- were widely blamed for paving the way for Communist penetration of our hemisphere. Matthews was the subject of numerous congressional hearings and often hounded by demonstrators.

 Although Matthews remained an editorial writer for the Times, the paper began distancing itself from him, and he was prohibited from writing any more news stories. In 1967, Matthews retired from daily journalism and devoted his remaining life to defending Castro and every word he had ever written about him. Matthews is considered a hero of the revolution in Cuba.

 DePalma tells the tragic story of Matthews thoroughly and objectively. I think his portrait of Matthews as a softheaded idealist rather than a left-wing ideologue is right, but DePalma is insufficiently critical of the Times, which handled things badly from beginning to end. Nevertheless, "The Man Who Invented Fidel" is well worth reading by journalists and non-journalists alike.