| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Product details
Would you like to give feedback on images?
|
Between 1929 and 1945, two great travails were visited upon the American people: the Great Depression and World War II. This Pulitzer Prize-winning history tells the story of how Americans endured, and eventually prevailed, in the face of those unprecedented calamities.
The Depression was both a disaster and an opportunity. As David Kennedy vividly demonstrates, the economic crisis of the 1930s was far more than a simple reaction to the alleged excesses of the 1920s. For more than a century before 1929, America's unbridled industrial revolution had gyrated through repeated boom-and-bust cycles, wastefully consuming capital and inflicting untold misery on city and countryside alike.
Freedom from Fear explores how the nation agonized over its role in World War II, how it fought the war, why the United States won, and why the consequences of victory were sometimes sweet, sometimes ironic. In a compelling narrative, Kennedy analyzes the determinants of American strategy, the painful choices faced by commanders and statesmen, and the agonies inflicted on the millions of ordinary Americans who were compelled to swallow their fears and face battle as best they could.
Both comprehensive and colorful, this account of the most convulsive period in American history, excepting only the Civil War, reveals a period that formed the crucible in which modern America was formed.
Please note: The individual volumes of the series have not been published in historical order. Freedom from Fear is number IX in The Oxford History of the United States.
Tag this product(What's this?)Think of a tag as a keyword or label you consider is strongly related to this product.
Tags will help all customers organise and find favourite items. |
Yet in some respects the volume is something of a disappointment. The book is a contribution to the superb 'Oxford History of the United States' series, which has set a high standard with its earlier volumes. It is by this measure that Kennedy's book is wanting; it is hardly the comprehensive examination of its topic that the earlier volumes were, as his focus on politics and economics gives short shrift to American culture and society during the period. Moreover, his prose often seems excessively grandiose. Efforts to create soaring metaphors often become too labored and fall flat, making for a stark contrast with the clear descriptions and jargon-free analysis they buttress.
Nevertheless, Kennedy's achievement with this book is impressive. He has provided a well-written account of America's efforts to deal with some of the greatest challenges that the nation ever faced. Readers seeking a history of the period would be hard pressed to find a better and more readable book with which to start.
| |||||
Amazon Home | |
| International Sites: United States | Germany | France | Japan | Canada | China | |
| Business Programs: Sell on Amazon | Fulfilment by Amazon | Join Associates | Join Advantage | |
| Customer Service | Help | View Basket | Your Account | |
| About Amazon.co.uk | Careers at Amazon | |
| Conditions of Use & Sale | Privacy Notice © 1996-2012, Amazon.com, Inc. and its affiliates |
