Look Homeward America: In Search of Reactionary Radicals (Hardcover)

~ (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

*Starred Review* "I am an American patriot," Kauffman begins, and after less than a paragraph of his customary fine, funny, dead-on-the-money phrasing about what that entails, does his first finger-pointing at role models: "I am the love child of Henry Thoreau and Dorothy Day." Dorothy who? (Please don't ask, "Henry who?") In chapter 2, Kauffman shiningly profiles that extraordinary pacifist activist, cofounder of the Catholic Worker Movement and the closest thing to St. Francis America has ever seen. He has already sketched two ex-senators he admires, Eugene McCarthy and Daniel Patrick Moynihan, and revealed why McCarthy was better: Moynihan was a truth teller like McCarthy but also, finally, a political coward. Kauffman's marvelous trick of praising to the skies and then noting shortcomings and even vices increases the fascination of his remarks on such defenders of "family, community, [and] local self-rule" as Wendell Berry, Grant Wood, Carolyn Chute, Millard Fillmore ("ranks with the Quaker Herbert Hoover as the most pacific president"), as well as more obscure figures. More marvelous is that Kauffman, who freely injects himself into his prose, treats himself the same way; he vaunts his stance on something and then acknowledges his contradictions on the same matter. If figures he considers overrated don't get the same treatment, well, that helps keep things snappy. His writing persona couldn't be more appealing. Ray Olson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review

"Kauffman’s marvelous trick of praising to the skies and then noting shortcomings and even vices increases the fascination of his remarks on such defenders of "family, community, [and] local self-rule" as Wendell Berry, Grant Wood, Carolyn Chute, Millard Fillmore...More marvelous is that Kauffman, who freely injects himself into his prose, treats himself the same way; he vaunts his stance on something and then acknowledges his contradictions on the same matter. If figures he considers overrated don’t get the same treatment, well, that helps keep things snappy. His writing persona couldn’t be more appealing."-Ray Olson, Booklist

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 250 pages
• Publisher: Intercollegiate Studies Institute (May 15, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1932236872
• ISBN-13: 978-1932236873
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.7 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #347,217 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

35 of 37 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Empire Has No Clothes, June 3, 2006

By	J. LaLonde (Lakeland, Florida, United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Bill Kauffman's "Look Homeward, America" is as refreshingly quirky as the heroes of place, community, and freedom one meets in its pages. It is a brilliant book, but also one that frequently causes the reader to wince--at times because Kauffman's keen observations are expressed so succinctly as to overwhelm with their heart-rending truth and honesty, at other times because his free flowing invective is so spot on it seems almost brutally cruel.

Part rhapsodic panegyric, part unmitigated venting of spleen, "Look Homeward, America" explores everything Kauffman loves and loathes about America: the modern America of chain restaurants, shopping malls, big box stores, fake boobs, and smart bombs and the not-yet-dead alternative America rooted in the love of place and communitarian values. Kauffman shows us that this alternative America has a worthy history exemplified by an unlikely cast of heroes including U.S. Senators Eugene McCarthy and Daniel Patrick Moynihan, founders of the Catholic Worker Movement Dorothy Day and Peter Maurin, mid-western visual artists John Steuart Curry and Grant Wood, Maine novelist and founder of a "love militia" Carolyn Chute, and the great Kentucky farmer and agrarian author and essayist Wendell Berry, just to name a few.

His invective is reserved mainly for politicians: JFK, LBJ, Nixon, Kissinger, Bush, Cheney, the Clintons. And it can be quite nasty: he calls Kennedy a "priapic skirt-chasing male bimbo" and mocks his "fabled forty-five second love marathons." He takes a nice swipe at the National Organization of Women, "who stroked Senator Clinton's randy husband as though they were silky hookers." And another swipe at "diversity," "...back in those prelapsarian days before mandatory 'diversity' drove off the entire nineteenth century and left our daughters with the belief that the Revolutionary and Civil Wars were fought primarily by runaway slaves and girls dress as boys."

But "Look Homeward" is not an endless tirade; there's plenty of love it in as well. One of the most interesting chapters in the book is about pariah novelist Carolyn Chute, a woman now universally ignored and disdained by the mainstream media and chattering literary class. Nevertheless, Carolyn Chute is a woman whose ideas deserve a hearing and thankfully Bill Kauffman had the gumption to interview her and share her insights with the public rather than turn away in horror from someone so un-p.c. as to advocate armed militias.

Although published by ISI, "Look Homeward" is not unlikely to make conservative Republican readers feel ill at ease. (For example, Kauffman at one point viciously flays Lamar Alexander while extolling the goodness of Mother Jones. And he's no more a fan of Reagan than Clinton or LBJ.) However, in a time of mindless red state/blue state myopia Kauffman's fearlessness in searching out the virtuous traits of politicos from both the left and the right of the political spectrum--what Kauffman calls "our hopelessly inadequate and painfully constrictive political corral"--is both stimulating and challenging.

"Look Homeward, America" is a fine book. At once discursive, discerning, gentle, bitter, nostalgic, and hopeful, it aptly describes the moral and spiritual emptiness of a far-flung empire of the deracinated, and the joys to be found instead in family and community life firmly rooted in place and history. It is also a nice antidote to Rod Dreher's Crunchy Cons, which is a fine book and expresses some of the same sentiments but is a bit too prissy and pulls too many punches. Bill Kauffman doesn't pull any punches.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Witty and Smart Critique of our Contemporary Political Culture, March 16, 2009

By	TEK (Lawrence, KS USA) - See all my reviews

This is a fine little book. I wouldn't go so far as to call it "brilliant," nor would I go so far as to call Kauffman "one of the finest writers of our time," as other reviewers have. I agree with another reviewer that Kauffman's vocabulary at times is a little over the top. There is a fine line between raising the bar and expecting more out of readers, on the one hand, and merely showing off on the other. At times Kauffman crossed that line, and it was a little annoying. Still, Kauffman is vary witty and smart, and if you can get past the occasional arrogance this book is very insightful. Kauffman's critique of contemporary culture is at times scathing, and there were quips that I thoroughly enjoyed.

As others have, I would also strongly recommend Crunchy Cons: The New Conservative Counterculture and Its Return to Roots by Rod Dreher. I think Dreher's book is better, but if you've read that and liked it then I think you'll also enjoy Kauffman's book. You will also like this book if you're a Wendell Berry fan.

One reviewer stated, "Although published by ISI, 'Look Homeward' is not unlikely to make conservative Republican readers feel ill at ease. (For example, Kauffman at one point viciously flays Lamar Alexander while extolling the goodness of Mother Jones. And he's no more a fan of Reagan than Clinton or LBJ.)" I have two problems with this statement. First, it implies that this book is not of the ISI norm; that it is some sort of oddity for ISI publishing. This implication is simply not true. While certainly Kauffman's tone is different than a lot of ISI's books, the content and outlook fall well within ISI's broad umbrella of conservative books. Indeed, it would be somewhat intellectually inconsistent for ISI fans to sing the praises of people like Kirk and yet shun people like Kauffman. My second problem with the above statement is the use of the term "conservative." By "conservative," the reviewer seems to be implying a wing of ISI supporters whose conservatism is the very thing being questioned by people like Kauffman and Dreher. I am of the opinion that it is the decidedly liberal members of ISI that will be disturbed by this book due to their commitment to Big Business, the Military Machine, and the status quo of the Republican Party. In fact, the reviewer's apparent commitment to Reagan, the Creator of the National Debt and the Modern Military Establishment, betrays this review's flavor of "conservatism." All that being said, I think this book is a fine fit for ISI.

I give this book four stars because it is good, not great. Still, it did make me want to read more books by Kauffman. I was happy to find another author that is in the same vein as Berry and Dreher.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Counter-intuitive, counter-revolutionary, intriguing and inspiring, November 17, 2008

By	Andrew S. Rogers (Seattle, Washington) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

I read Bill Kauffman's remarkable Ain't My America: The Long, Noble History of Antiwar Conservatism and Middle-American Anti-Imperialism not long ago, and while I think "Look Homeward, America" is every bit as educational and inspirational, I probably should have read it first. Personally, I found "Ain't..." a more satisfying mix of polemic and personality, in that it was heavier on the former while "Look Homeward..." is stronger on the latter. But taken together, the two books are a solid defense of the almost-forgotten, certainly suppressed, patriotism of localism, liberty, and peace.

The author's argument in "Look Homeward, America" takes the adventurous reader into a world of ideas and ideals a long way from public elementary school civics classes, and equally far from the conventional taxonomy of "liberal" and "conservative." At times, Kauffman's attempt to describe Gene McCarthy and Daniel Patrick Moynihan as "conservatives" -- even of this eclectic sort -- reminded me of a book I read a long time ago (Say the Right Thing: Talk Radio's Favorite Conservative Quotes, Notes and Gloats by GOP activist Floyd Brown and Seattle talk radio host Kirby Wilbur) which included so-called "conservative" quotations from people like Chairman Mao and William O. Douglas. Saying a few "conservative" things does not make one a "conservative," however you choose to define it. So I admit to some skepticism here. However, I am certainly willing to be convinced, because I have gained a great deal of respect for Bill Kauffman's view of the world, as well as his remarkable skill as an entertaining and engrossing writer.

I learned quite a bit from "Look Homeward, America" though, as I said, I personally found "Ain't My America" a stronger book. I am now reading Kauffman's brand-new Forgotten Founder, Drunken Prophet: The Life of Luther Martin (Lives of the Founders), which is itself proving to be a remarkable book. For best results, I would view "Look Homeward..." as the first part of a trilogy that includes those other titles as well. If the picture Kauffman paints in this book intrigues your intellect, tugs at your heartstrings, or both, you'll only benefit from following the author into those next books as well.