The Crosswinds of Freedom: The American Experiment Vol.3 - Hardcover

Burns, James Macgregor

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0394512766 ISBN 13: 9780394512761

Publisher: Knopf, 1989

Synopsis

A winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award analyzes the history of the U.S. for the past 55 years

About this title

Reviews

Immensely readable, epic in scope yet intimately personal in detail, this sweeping 864-page history of the United States extends from FDR's nomination to the presidency in 1932 to the election of George Bush. Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Burns sees the U.S. as a nation of hazy, undefined ends and shaky, pluralistic means. He admires Roosevelt but criticizes the New Deal because it "failed to fashion an effective economic strategy and stick with it." With 1950s' affluence, he notes, came widespread escapism, intertwining of government and the press, McCarthyism, conformity, compartmentalized work. Burns portrays JFK and LBJ as men who ultimately failed to respond to the cries for freedom emanating from the Third World. He is brief and equivocal on Reagan's rightist counterrevolution, though he recognizes Reagan's mandate to throw liberal elements out of the Republican Party and consolidate conservative power. Chapters broadly delineate the civil rights, feminist and student movements, Vietnam, cultural and technological ferment. This is the final volume of Burns's trilogy which includes The Vineyard of Liberty and The Workshop of Democracy.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

The boundaries of this final book in Burns's lively history of the United States--the presidencies of Franklin Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan--frequently overlap with the many books written by Burns, the political scientist on his way to becoming a distinguished commentator on our recent leaders and institutions. The result is both strength and weakness. Strength, in that his political analyses and asides on the varying meanings of freedom are very good indeed. Weakness, in that his original works are necessarily richer statements than a survey can be, and in that his treatment of social and cultural matters is overmatched. Even so, his project is unquestionably a fine achievement. This book, which follows The Vineyard of Liberty ( LJ 12/15/81) and The Workshop of Democracy ( LJ 8/85) will be all but universally acquired by libraries.
- Robert F. Nardini, N. Chichester, N.H.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Knopf
• Publication date: 1989
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0394512766
• ISBN 13: 9780394512761
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 864