Kurt Andersen

You’re entitled to your own opinion but not your own facts Fantasy is the USA’s primary product. From the Pilgrim Fathers onward America has been a place where renegades and freaks came in search of freedom to create their own realities with little objectively regulated truth standing in their way. The freedom to invent and believe whatever the hell you like is, in some ways, an unwritten constitutional right. But, this do-your-own-thing freedom also is the driving credo of America's current transformation where the difference between opinion and fact is rapidly crumbling. So how did we get to this weird pseudo-reality, where science and objective facts are dismissed in favour of opinions and wild speculation, or indeed, fantasies? The post truth, fake news, free-for-all mentality isn’t exactly a new phenomenon. If you want to understand Trump's America, how the lines between reality and illusion have become dangerously blurred, you have to go back to the very beginning and take a dizzying road trip across five centuries of crackpot delusion and make-believe from Salem to Scientology. Fantasyland is a journey that connects the dots between crazed franchises of true believers – a rich freak show tapestry from Mormons to Flat-Earthers and satanic panic, new age quacks to anti-vaxxers, conspiracy theorists of every stripe, creationists to climate change deniers, UFO-obsessives to gun-toting libertarians, showmen hucksters from P T Barnum to Trump himself, all topped off with a dangerous dose of anti-government paranoia and pseudoscience. Along the way, New York Times bestselling author Kurt Andersen has created a unique and raucous history of America and a new paradigm for understanding our post-factual world.

How America Went Haywire: A 500-Year History

Fantasyland

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER How an elite cabal rewrote the American dream for their gain - and left the rest of the world behind. 'Elegantly written, full of insight' - Justin Webb 'Absorbing, infuriating, full-of-facts-you-didn't-know, saxophonely written' - Anand Giridharadas 'Kurt Andersen at his riveting best' - Matthew D'Ancona Evil Geniuses is the secret history of how, over the last half century, America has sharply swerved away from its dream of progress for the many to a system of unfettered profit and self-interest for the few. As the social liberation of the 1960s finally ended in the chaos of Vietnam and Watergate, a faction of rich industrialists, business chiefs, wide-eyed libertarians and right-wing economic radicals were waiting, determined to claw back everything they saw as rightfully theirs. Reaching back into the dangerous powers of nostalgia, they emulated the unchecked robber barons of the past - veiling their actions as a return to the good old days, and winning over the people in the name of traditional American values. In this hugely entertaining and deeply researched cultural and economic exposé, New York Times bestselling author Kurt Andersen maps the rich history of intricate networks, unlikely connections and dark truths which are controlling a nation, revealing how on earth America got to where it is now - and what it might do to win its progressive future back.

The Unmaking of America – A Recent History

Evil Geniuses

"Offers a new understanding of our post-truth world and explains the American instinct to believe in make-believe, from the Pilgrims to P.T. Barnum to Disneyland to zealots of every stripe ... to Donald Trump"--

Untitled Nonfiction

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • When did America give up on fairness? The author of Fantasyland tells the epic history of how America decided that big business gets whatever it wants, only the rich get richer, and nothing should ever change—and charts a way back to the future. “The one book everyone must read as we figure out how to rebuild our country.”—Walter Isaacson, author of Steve Jobs and Leonardo da Vinci During the twentieth century, America managed to make its economic and social systems both more and more fair and more and more prosperous. A huge, secure, and contented middle class emerged. All boats rose together. But then the New Deal gave way to the Raw Deal. Beginning in the early 1970s, by means of a long war conceived of and executed by a confederacy of big business CEOs, the superrich, and right-wing zealots, the rules and norms that made the American middle class possible were undermined and dismantled. The clock was turned back on a century of economic progress, making greed good, workers powerless, and the market all-powerful while weaponizing nostalgia, lifting up an oligarchy that served only its own interests, and leaving the huge majority of Americans with dwindling economic prospects and hope. Why and how did America take such a wrong turn? In this deeply researched and brilliantly woven cultural, economic, and political chronicle, Kurt Andersen offers a fresh, provocative, and eye-opening history of America’s undoing, naming names, showing receipts, and unsparingly assigning blame—to the radical right in economics and the law, the high priests of high finance, a complacent and complicit Establishment, and liberal “useful idiots,” among whom he includes himself. Only a writer with Andersen’s crackling energy, deep insight, and ability to connect disparate dots and see complex systems with clarity could make such a book both intellectually formidable and vastly entertaining. And only a writer of Andersen’s vision could reckon with our current high-stakes inflection point, and show the way out of this man-made disaster.

The Unmaking of America: A Recent History

Withdrawing herself from consideration for Supreme Court Judgeship, distinguished judge Karen Hollander reflects on the reasons for her decision while remembering her coming of age in 1960s America, during which she experienced a formative event that reverberates in the cultural landscape of her present-day life. By the best-selling author of Heyday. 40,000 first printing.

A Novel

True Believers

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “The single most important explanation, and the fullest explanation, of how Donald Trump became president of the United States . . . nothing less than the most important book that I have read this year.”—Lawrence O’Donnell How did we get here? In this sweeping, eloquent history of America, Kurt Andersen shows that what’s happening in our country today—this post-factual, “fake news” moment we’re all living through—is not something new, but rather the ultimate expression of our national character. America was founded by wishful dreamers, magical thinkers, and true believers, by hucksters and their suckers. Fantasy is deeply embedded in our DNA. Over the course of five centuries—from the Salem witch trials to Scientology to the Satanic Panic of the 1980s, from P. T. Barnum to Hollywood and the anything-goes, wild-and-crazy sixties, from conspiracy theories to our fetish for guns and obsession with extraterrestrials—our love of the fantastic has made America exceptional in a way that we've never fully acknowledged. From the start, our ultra-individualism was attached to epic dreams and epic fantasies—every citizen was free to believe absolutely anything, or to pretend to be absolutely anybody. With the gleeful erudition and tell-it-like-it-is ferocity of a Christopher Hitchens, Andersen explores whether the great American experiment in liberty has gone off the rails. Fantasyland could not appear at a more perfect moment. If you want to understand Donald Trump and the culture of twenty-first-century America, if you want to know how the lines between reality and illusion have become dangerously blurred, you must read this book. NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE “This is a blockbuster of a book. Take a deep breath and dive in.”—Tom Brokaw “[An] absorbing, must-read polemic . . . a provocative new study of America’s cultural history.”—Newsday “Compelling and totally unnerving.”—The Village Voice “A frighteningly convincing and sometimes uproarious picture of a country in steep, perhaps terminal decline that would have the founding fathers weeping into their beards.”—The Guardian “This is an important book—the indispensable book—for understanding America in the age of Trump.”—Walter Isaacson, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Leonardo da Vinci

A 500-Year History

Fantasyland : How America Went Haywire

Julie Burstein

“This is a book about joy, drive and art, work that we’re all capable of if we’ll only commit.” —Seth Godin, author of Linchpin Public Radio International’s Julie Burstein, creator of the award-winning program Studio 360, along with its host Kurt Andersen, offers a rare, fascinating glimpse into some of the 21st century's greatest creative minds—from Yo-Yo Ma and Robert Plant to Mira Nair and Chuck Close, to David Milch and Joyce Carol Oates, to Rosanne Cash and beyond. Fans of Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers, Daniel Pink’s A Whole New Mind, Rosamund Zander’s The Art of Possibility, and Lynda Barry’s What It Is will be enthralled and electrified by this unique look at the creative process of the world’s most talented and prolific artists.

How Creativity Works

Spark

Englishman Benjamin Knowles heads for America to build a new life and joins up with three young Americans--journalist Timothy Skaggs, war veteran Duff Lucking, and Duff's actress sister, Polly--to seek their fortunes in the gold fields of California.

Heyday

At the turn of the twenty-first century millennium, a hip, savvy New York couple--George, a network television producer, and Lizzie, a software executive--explores the mysteries of love, temptation, financial hijinks, the media, and capitalism, in a humorous comedy of manners. Reprint.

Turn of the Century

Alec Baldwin

"This book and its contents are not authorized or endorsed by Donald J. Trump, any of his companies, or the White House"--Title page verso.

The Really Tremendous Inside Story of My Fantastic First Year as President Donald J. Trump

You Can't Spell America Without Me

Turn of the century

A big, fresh, energetic, hyperrealistic, up-to-the-second comedy of manners set in Manhattan in 2000, "Turn of the Century" depicts marriage, family, friendship, and business as they are conducted at the giddy, anxious end of the millennium.

Heinrich Böll

Leila Vennewitz

Nobel Prize winner Heinrich Böll's powerful novel about a woman terrorized by the media In an era in which journalists will stop at nothing to break a story, Henrich Böll's The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum has taken on heightened relevance. A young woman's association with a hunted man makes her the target of a journalist determined to grab headlines by portraying her as an evil woman. As the attacks on her escalate and she becomes the victim of anonymous threats, Katharina sees only one way out of her nightmare. Turning the mystery genre on its head, the novel begins with the confession of a crime, drawing the reader into a web of sensationalism, character assassination, and the unavoidable eruption of violence.

The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum, Or, How Violence Develops and where it Can Lead

كيف أثر قط طفولة ريتشارد فورد على عمله الروائي؟ كيف تأثرت لوحات تشاك كلوز بعدم قدرته على تذكر الوجوه؟ ما اللحظة المحورية التي ساعدت روزان كاش على فهم قوة الشفاء على المسرح؟ الإبداع هو موضوع بعيد المنال؛ فنحن نتمتع بثماره: الأفلام، والروايات، واللوحات، والأغاني - ولكننا نادرًا ما كنا مطلعين على ما يحدث في أثناء العملية الإبداعية؛ ففي سبارك، تتبع جولي بيرشتاين جذور بعض المفكرين والمبدعين الأكثر تأثيرًا في القرن الحادي والعشرين، بما في ذلك جويس كارول أوتس، يو يو ما، ديفيد ميلش، إيزابيل الليندي، وجوشوا ريدمان. حيث تقوم جولي بكشف الستار عن مصادر إلهام هؤلاء الفنانين، والعمليات التي تبرز عملهم الى حيز الوجود. كتبت جولي: «قد لا يغير هؤلاء الفنانين الرصاص إلى ذهب»، وأضافت: «لكنهم رفعوا الأشياء من سياقاتها المألوفة، وجمعوها، وأعادوا تشكيلها، وحولوها إلى أعمال فنية تغير الطريقة التي نرى بها العالم». يعدُّ كتاب سبارك مصدرًا قيمًا للكاتب والفنان الطموح، ولكن تمتد الحاجة إلى الإبداع إلى ما وراء عالم فرش الرسم والآلات الكاتبة؛ فالإبداع جزء لا يتجزأ من العمل، وتربية الأطفال، والتعليم، والعلوم، وربما الأكثر تأثيراً في علاقاتنا الشخصية، ونادرًا ما تضيء كتب الإبداع وتلهم؛ ​​ولكن سيلهمك هذا الكتاب الرائع ويساعدك في العثور على سبارك بنفسك. العبيكان 2017

Spark: How Creativity Works

سبارك : كيف يعمل الإبداع؟

Heyday is a brilliantly imagined, wildly entertaining tale of America’s boisterous coming of age–a sweeping panorama of madcap rebellion and overnight fortunes, palaces and brothels, murder and revenge–as well as the story of a handful of unforgettable characters discovering the nature of freedom, loyalty, friendship, and true love. In the middle of the nineteenth century, modern life is being born: the mind-boggling marvels of photography, the telegraph, and railroads; a flood of show business spectacles and newspapers; rampant sex and drugs and drink (and moral crusades against all three); Wall Street awash with money; and giddy utopian visions everywhere. Then, during a single amazing month at the beginning of 1848, history lurches: America wins its war of manifest destiny against Mexico, gold is discovered in northern California, and revolutions sweep across Europe–sending one eager English gentleman off on an epic transatlantic adventure. . . . Amid the tumult, aristocratic Benjamin Knowles impulsively abandons the Old World to reinvent himself in New York, where he finds himself embraced by three restless young Americans: Timothy Skaggs, muckraking journalist, daguerreotypist, pleasure-seeker, stargazer; the fireman Duff Lucking, a sweet but dangerously damaged veteran of the Mexican War; and Duff’s dazzling sister Polly Lucking, a strong-minded, free thinking actress (and discreet part-time prostitute) with whom Ben falls hopelessly in love. Beckoned by the frontier, new beginnings, and the prospects of the California Gold Rush, all four set out on a transcontinental race west–relentlessly tracked, unbeknownst to them, by a cold-blooded killer bent on revenge. A fresh, impeccable portrait of an era startlingly reminiscent of our own times, Heyday is by turns tragic and funny and sublime, filled with bona fide heroes and lost souls, visionaries (Walt Whitman, Charles Darwin, Alexis de Tocqueville) and monsters, expanding horizons and narrow escapes. It is also an affecting story of four people passionately chasing their American dreams at a time when America herself was still being dreamed up–an enthralling, old-fashioned yarn interwoven with a bracingly modern novel of ideas. "In this utterly engaging novel, the author of Turn of the Century brings 19th-century America vividly to life . . . While this is a long book, it moves quickly, with historical detail that's involving but never a drag on the action; the characters are beautifully drawn. A terrific book; highly recommended." –Library Journal "Heyday is fuled by manic energy, fanatical research, and a wicked sense of humor.... It's a joyful, wild gallop through a joyful, wild time to be an American." -Vanity Fair

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • When did America give up on fairness? The author of Fantasyland tells the epic history of how America decided that big business gets whatever it wants, only the rich get richer, and nothing should ever change—and charts a way back to the future. “Essential, absorbing . . . a graceful, authoritative guide . . . a radicalized moderate’s moderate case for radical change.”—The New York Times Book Review During the twentieth century, America managed to make its economic and social systems both more and more fair and more and more prosperous. A huge, secure, and contented middle class emerged. All boats rose together. But then the New Deal gave way to the Raw Deal. Beginning in the early 1970s, by means of a long war conceived of and executed by a confederacy of big business CEOs, the superrich, and right-wing zealots, the rules and norms that made the American middle class possible were undermined and dismantled. The clock was turned back on a century of economic progress, making greed good, workers powerless, and the market all-powerful while weaponizing nostalgia, lifting up an oligarchy that served only its own interests, and leaving the huge majority of Americans with dwindling economic prospects and hope. Why and how did America take such a wrong turn? In this deeply researched and brilliantly woven cultural, economic, and political chronicle, Kurt Andersen offers a fresh, provocative, and eye-opening history of America’s undoing, naming names, showing receipts, and unsparingly assigning blame—to the radical right in economics and the law, the high priests of high finance, a complacent and complicit Establishment, and liberal “useful idiots,” among whom he includes himself. Only a writer with Andersen’s crackling energy, deep insight, and ability to connect disparate dots and see complex systems with clarity could make such a book both intellectually formidable and vastly entertaining. And only a writer of Andersen’s vision could reckon with our current high-stakes inflection point, and show the way out of this man-made disaster.

You may already know that Belgium is the most boring country on planet Earth, but do you know why? Or what makes the Mark 44, Model O Lazy Dog Missile Cluster, the sexiest piece of military hardware on wheels? Or how LSD edged out all contenders as the Platonic Ideal of illicit drugs? From cities to sitcoms, from scotch to soda, from English monarchs to French movies, The Real Thing is a compendium of the quintessential, providing definitive answers to some of the most compelling questions of our time: What confection out-cholesterols the competition? Why is The Country Club the country club? Which Charlie Chan proved the least scrutable? Author Kurt Andersen’s pithy pronouncements sparkle with wit, sophistication, and a healthy dose of skeptical good humor as he strips world culture of accumulated hype and accepted wisdom, laying bare the sine qua nons and the ne plus ultras in a sassy series of satirical essays that give credit where credit is due while simultaneously foreclosing on the bogus, the ersatz, the would-be, and the has-been. The Real Thing is the real thing. These days, that’s really something.

The Real Thing

Lisa Birnbach

Jamie Malanowski

A compilation of on- and off-the-record utterances by the famous and infamous, includes Prince Charles telling his fondest hopes to his lover and Michael Jackson's housekeeper describing life with Jacko

Kurt Andersen

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