The Liberal Mind in a Conservative Age: American Intellectuals in the 1940s and 1950s [Paperback]

Richard H. Pells (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 15, 1989

An excellent study of American intellectuals in the 40's and 50's.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

The period between the close of World War II and the American government's full-scale involvement in Vietnam was, we have long been told, a gray one in the annals of political dissent and liberalism. But Richard Pells shows that the times had more to them than a tired acceptance of things as they were. He examines intellectuals of the period--C. Wright Mills, Dwight MacDonald, Arthur Schlesinger, Daniel Boorstin, Hannah Arendt, Norman Mailer, Paul Goodman, and Edmund Wilson among them--who resisted the reigning conservatism through their writings in magazines like Dissent, The New Republic, and Partisan Review. These heroes fought among themselves so much that they could never constitute an organized political body, but they did keep things lively, even if conservative critics were readily able to steamroller them. This is solid social history that turns up several surprises.

Review

"The New York intellectuals are fortunate this time out in being in the hands of a chronicler who grinds no axes o their reputations and does them the courtesy of close if sometimes critical readings." --Walter Goodman, The New York Times

"An excellent study of American intellectuals in the 1940's and 1950's."--David M. Oshinsky, The New York Time Book Review

"Without question this is a significant work of scholarship by a serious and able historian. It will certainly long stand as an interpretive work to be reckoned with as our understanding of the early post-war period continues to evolve"--Paul Boyer, Reviews in American History.

"[This book] contains perceptive discussions of major thinkers and intellectual movements." -- Christopher Lasch, Journal of American History

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 488 pages
• Publisher: Wesleyan; 2nd edition (September 15, 1989)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0819562254
• ISBN-13: 978-0819562258
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.5 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #716,865 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I am Professor of History Emeritus at the University of Texas in Austin. I specialize in 20th century American cultural history, with a special focus on the impact of American culture on other countries. I have received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, as well as 6 Fulbright chairs and senior lectureships. I have lived and lectured all over Europe, as well as in Turkey, Southeast Asia, Australia, Mexico, and Brazil. It was these experiences living abroad that stimulated my interest in how America affected other people's cultures, and how foreign cultures affected America. These themes are particularly emphasized in my most recent two books: Not Like Us and Modernist America. My books have been reviewed in Newsweek, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the New Republic. I also contribute articles regularly to magazines and newspapers including the Chronicle of Higher Education, the Los Angeles Times, and the International Herald Tribune. I am now at work on a book called War Babies, about the generationof Americans born between 1939 and 1945 and their influence on American culture and politics from the 1950s to the present.