The American Future: A History From The Founding Fathers To Barack Obama

Simon Schama

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Published by Vintage, part of Vintage Publishing

Format: Paperback

£9.99

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Details

EAN: 9780099520399
Published: 2 Jul 2009

About the book

Synopsis

The American Future traces the history of a country whose most enduring trait is its capacity for self-renewal, especially at times of disaster. Examining issues of power, race and immigration, religious fervour and prosperity, this masterful portrait of the world's most controversial superpower looks backwards and forwards to understand why now, more than ever, the fate of America, and by extension the rest of the world, is hanging in the balance.

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What the critics say

Schama is a genius of storytelling
- The Times

The American Future shares Kerouac's almost inebriated eloquence, the words tumbling delightfully across the page, the sentences as playfully ornate as the Charlie Parker saxophone solos that Kerouac so adored... Also an inspiring and illuminating work of history, a reflection on the essence of America with a bedrock of deep knowledge behind the bebop prose. A more inspiring evocation of the spirit of liberal America - past, present and future - does not exist
- Financial Times

The master storyteller takes on the greatest story of our time, America ... Essential reading
- Tatler

This is the most exhilarating book that has been written about America for at least eight years...ebulliently combative...instantly engaging...weaving the immediate present with its earlier history... Schama has delivered a glittering tale of America's past
- Spectator

A wonderfully thought-provoking book... Schama continually illuminates the broad sweep of events with reference to telling details...fascinating
- Daily Express

By this author

About the Author

Simon Schama is University Professor of Art History and History at Columbia University in New York. His books have been translated into 15 languages and give an idea of his range: Citizens: a Chronicle of the French Revolution, Landscape and Memory, Rembrandt's Eyes, A History of Britain, The Power of Art, Rough Crossings and, most recently, The American Future: A History. His art columns for the New Yorker won the national magazine Award for criticsim and journalism and his journalism has appeared regularly in the Guardian and Financial Times where he is Contributing Editor. He has written and presented forty films for BBC2 on subjects as diverse as Tolstoy, American politics and John Donne and won an Emmy for The Power of Art. Simon Schama was awarded a CBE in 2001.

Simon Schama