- Hardcover: 288 pages
- Publisher: WW Norton & Co; New edition edition (15 Jan 1979)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0393011771
- ISBN-13: 978-0393011777
- Product Dimensions: 21.8 x 14.5 x 3.3 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 426,256 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Review
Cultural history at its best. . . . Provokes, startles, and keeps the reader arguing with himself as well as with the writer. . . . A book of fundamental importance.--Bruce Mazlish, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
--This text refers to the
Paperback
edition.
Product Description
The book quickly became a bestseller. This edition includes a new afterword, "The Culture of Narcissism Revisited."
--This text refers to the
Paperback
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First Sentence
The Waning of the Sense of Historical Time As the twentieth century approaches its end, the conviction grows that many other things are ending too. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
The Waning of the Sense of Historical Time As the twentieth century approaches its end, the conviction grows that many other things are ending too. Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
14 of 14 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Some would call this book 'prophetic'.
Even though it was written in the Seventies, many of the points this book makes, and social trends it uncovers, where not only true then, but are exacerbated today.
This book, though focusing on the United States, is relevant for the entire Western society. It challenges the 'improvement' in our society brought about by a mix of capitalism, liberalism and consumerism. It questions the values of such a society, and challenges motivations behind recent social 'movements' and campaigns.
A must read for anyone wondering how we have arrived at the world we live in today where everything should be OK, but isn't. Where secularism has not provided a 'one for all' mentality, but 'every man for himself'. Where bewildered parents wonder what parenting means. Where the workplace is and environment of antagonism with a smile. Where liberalism has created a world with enforced boundaries. Where it's not a question of whether you are right, but whether you get caught. Where hope has been strangled by 'diminishing expectations'.
Many books could fall into the trap of being judgemental, or harking back with rose-tinted views of days and decades past. This book doesn't do this, it just stands out as a fair and accurate condemnation of where American Society was heading in the 1970's (and where it is today).
8 of 31 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
'The Culture of Narcissism - American Life in an Age of Diminishing Expectations' was published in the first year of the unhappy presidency of Jimmy Carter (1979). The latter endorsed the book publicly (in his famous 'national malaise' speech). The main thesis of the book is that the Americans have created a self-absorbed (though not self aware), greedy and frivolous society which depended on consumerism, demographic studies, opinion polls and Government to know and to define itself. What is the solution? Lasch proposed a 'return to basics': self-reliance, the family, nature, the community, and the Protestant work ethic. To those who adhere, he promised an elimination of their feelings of alienation and despair. There is no single Lasch. This chronicler of culture, did so mainly by chronicling his inner turmoil, conflicting ideas and ideologies, emotional upheavals, and intellectual vicissitudes. In this sense, of (courageous) self-documentation, Mr. Lasch epitomized Narcissism, was the quintessential Narcissist, the better positioned to criticize the phenomenon. Some 'scientific' disciplines (e.g., the history of culture and History in general) are closer to art than to the rigorous (a.k.a. 'exact' or 'natural' or 'physical' sciences). Lasch borrowed heavily from other, more established branches of knowledge without paying tribute to the original, strict meaning of concepts and terms. Such was the use that he made of 'Narcissism'. Lasch's greatest error was that he did not acknowledge that there is an abyss between narcissism and self love, being interested in oneself and being obsessively preoccupied with oneself. Lasch confuses the two. The price of progress is growing self-awareness and with it growing pains and the pains of growing up. It is not a loss of meaning and hope - it is just that pain has a tendency to push everything to the background. Those are constructive pains, signs of adjustment and adaptation, of evolution. America has no inflated, megalomaniac, grandiose ego. It never built an overseas empire, it is made of dozens of ethnic immigrant groups, it strives to learn, to emulate. Americans do not lack empathy - they are the foremost nation of volunteers and also professes the biggest number of (tax deductible) donation makers. Americans are not exploitative - they are hard workers, fair players, Adam Smith-ian egoists. They believe in Live and Let Live. They are individualists and they believe that the individual is the source of all authority and the universal yardstick and benchmark. This is a positive philosophy. Granted, it led to inequalities in the distribution of income and wealth. But then other ideologies had much worse outcomes. Luckily, they were defeated by the human spirit, the best manifestation of which is still democratic capitalism. Sam Vaknin, author of 'Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited'.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
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30 reviews
100 of 108 people found the following review helpful
A well-written, literate, persuasive cultural analysis...
17 Oct 2005
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
I found this book very throught-provoking, in the boldness and bleakness of its basic thesis (that narcissism is really about fear [and is not simply about vanity]; and that America is a culture that suffers from [and promotes] fear [of nothingness, of "no exit"]). Due to this narcissistic fear, Lasch believes that Americans lack a purpose, an "end-point," and that this anomie, coupled with gross cultural overloads (the failure of the family, the intrusion of the state into the family, the substitution of state paternalism for individual self-initiative, the erosion of authority, the "therapeutic culture," and so forth) gives rise to "the spectacle" designed to distract America from the fear of being nothing and its inner rage (whew! that was a sentence!).
It takes some effort to grasp Lasch's thesis, and I found some of the commentary dated (as one might expect from a book published in 1979), but the writing is very polished and thoughtfully provocative.
All of the "problems" I encountered with the book were those of trying to understand, think through, "test" and consider Lasch's ideas--which, to me, are all marks a good book. I can find fault with specifics in Lasch's ideas, but overall, this was a persuasive, interesting, and compelling union of cultural and individual analysis, centered on the psychoanalytic concept of narcissism and America's unique history. Specific topics included: (a) "making it" in America; (b) pseudo self-awareness and the spectacle of politics and celebrity; (c) the degradation of sport; (d) the commoditization of education and its focus on "life adjustment;" (e) socialization of reproduction and the collapse of authority; (f) the flight from ("true") feeling embodied in a culture of promiscuity and sexual warfare (perhaps his least balanced chapter); (g) the "planned obsolescence" of older persons; and (h) the link between our bureaucratic culture and narcissistic dependence on it.
The overall tone of the book reminded me of Joan Didion's novels and Yates' poem Slouching Toward Bethlehem--fear and anxiety about nothing within, nothing without, simply our neediness. Lasch's book also reminded me of another psychoanalytically informed cultural critique from the 1950s, Norman Brown's Love's Body.
It takes some effort to grasp Lasch's thesis, and I found some of the commentary dated (as one might expect from a book published in 1979), but the writing is very polished and thoughtfully provocative.
All of the "problems" I encountered with the book were those of trying to understand, think through, "test" and consider Lasch's ideas--which, to me, are all marks a good book. I can find fault with specifics in Lasch's ideas, but overall, this was a persuasive, interesting, and compelling union of cultural and individual analysis, centered on the psychoanalytic concept of narcissism and America's unique history. Specific topics included: (a) "making it" in America; (b) pseudo self-awareness and the spectacle of politics and celebrity; (c) the degradation of sport; (d) the commoditization of education and its focus on "life adjustment;" (e) socialization of reproduction and the collapse of authority; (f) the flight from ("true") feeling embodied in a culture of promiscuity and sexual warfare (perhaps his least balanced chapter); (g) the "planned obsolescence" of older persons; and (h) the link between our bureaucratic culture and narcissistic dependence on it.
The overall tone of the book reminded me of Joan Didion's novels and Yates' poem Slouching Toward Bethlehem--fear and anxiety about nothing within, nothing without, simply our neediness. Lasch's book also reminded me of another psychoanalytically informed cultural critique from the 1950s, Norman Brown's Love's Body.
31 of 35 people found the following review helpful
Fantastic reading !
23 April 2005
Format:Paperback
Lasch has touched a very sensistive social nerve in his book "The Culture Of Narcissism." He gives the reader the awareness of living in a society that has become increasingly self-absorbed, out of touch with its past and future, and totally focused on the moment where everyone is seeking decadence and immediate self-gratification. I strongly believe that the narcissism in our culture is the direct result of the combination of consumerism and individualism that are both advocated for by the corporate elite and the politicians. The end result is profits !!! Lasch's book is a powerful and accurate portrayal of an ailing society heading toward disaster....
I would highly recommend this book for every American that is interested in comprehending himself and his society. It will surely provide the reader with an educational experience and an electrifying reading!
I would highly recommend this book for every American that is interested in comprehending himself and his society. It will surely provide the reader with an educational experience and an electrifying reading!
38 of 44 people found the following review helpful
A book for which there should be renewed interest
22 April 1999
Format:Paperback
While I have always felt that Lasch, in general, relied too heavily on Freudian theory in his arguments (which is a shame, given his outstanding knowledge of both history and sociology), the specific portrait he draws of the modern american personality is both accurate and damning - this is Freud that works! There should be a new popularity for this several-years-old book since it is, however unintentionally, the psycho-biography of William Jefferson Clinton. If you ever wondered why the most powerful man on earth risked all to dally with a 21 year-old intern or what made a former peacenik into the Bomber of the Balkans, you must read this book. The real answers are there. Additionally, the late Prof. Lasch was an excellent stylist... if only other academics wrote half as well.
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