New World Coming: The 1920s And The Making Of Modern America [Paperback]

Nathan Miller (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0306813793 | ISBN-13: 978-0306813795 | Publication Date: July 27, 2004

The images of the 1920s have been indelibly imprinted on the American imagination-from jazz, bootleggers, flappers, talkies, the Model T Ford, Babe Ruth, and Charles Lindbergh to the fight for women's right to vote, racial injustice, and the birth of organized crime.Nathan Miller has penned the ultimate introduction to the era. Publishers Weekly calls it "an excellent chronicle of that turbulent, troubled, and tempestuous decade," and Jonathan Yardley's Washington Post review proclaimed this the new classic history of the 1920s, replacing Frederick Lewis Allen's celebrated account.Using the life of F. Scott Fitzgerald as a backdrop, Miller describes the world of Calvin Coolidge, H. L. Mencken, Woodrow Wilson, and the Red Scare in extraordinarily accessible (and frequently witty) writing, New World Coming is destined to become the book we all turn to to recall one of the most beloved eras in American history.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Miller (Theodore Roosevelt: A Life; FDR: An Intimate History; etc.) quite eloquently illuminates the United States as it existed under presidents Harding, Coolidge and Hoover, using the life of F. Scott Fitzgerald, with all its peaks and valleys during the 1920s, as the backbone of his narrative. But Miller's book is much more complex than a mere discussion of Fitzgerald or such related phenomena as the Lost Generation and the Jazz Age. In addition to events in the arts and sciences, Miller details bitter labor struggles, the rise of the reconstituted Ku Klux Klan and Prohibition. Woven into this text are vivid portrayals of such personalities as H.L. Mencken (who coined the famous phrase, "No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people") and the young, relatively unknown Franklin Roosevelt, dealing with the onset of polio. Miller's provocative prose dovetails such notables as Al Capone, evangelist Billy Sunday, birth-control advocate Margaret Sanger and aviator Charles Lindbergh. In addition to personalities, Miller is also keen to depict key trends and events, and, where appropriate, he notes them as distant mirrors of our own age. This is particularly Miller's ambition when it comes to the rampant stock market speculation of the 1920s and such corporate scandals as the Teapot Dome affair. In sum, this volume comprises an excellent chronicle of that turbulent, troubled and tempestuous decade called "the roaring '20s." Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

Miller characterizes the 1920s as a decade full of drinking, dancing, hedonism, and crime. Miller first concentrates on the writer who captured the decade's insouciance and ennui in The Great Gatsby, periodically revisiting F. Scott Fitzgerald's self-destructive slide, then returning to recount the period's social and economic trends. Blacks moved north, women began voting, factories hummed, farms stagnated, stocks inflated, and speakeasies proliferated. Presiding over the turbulence, the five presidents of the period (Wilson through FDR) receive Miller's closest narrative attention, their reputations illustrated with telling anecdotes, such as Harding's signing a bill on a golf course. Considering this work's density of data and personalities from Klansmen to jazzmen to evangelists, Miller's structuring is notably skillful. A suave, entertaining survey. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 448 pages
• Publisher: Da Capo Press (July 27, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0306813793
• ISBN-13: 978-0306813795
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 5.8 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #231,712 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

30 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A Well-written History, but No New Outlook or Judgments, December 9, 2003

By 

Jeffery Steele (Taipei, Taiwan) - See all my reviews

This review is from: New World Coming : The 1920s and the Making of Modern America (Hardcover)

Nathan Miller writes well enough to keep your attention throughout this book. He hits all the highlights of one of the most celebrated decades in U.S. history - from F Scott Fitzgerald to Charles Lindbergh, from the Scopes Trial to women's changing fashions -- but never gets bogged down on any particular area.

But Miller's judgments on the decade are too conventional. He has, for example, the typical disdain for the three Republican presidents whose tenure spans the decade. He wears it lightly, but it's obviously there. Miller also seems to accept much of the criticism by America's men of letters for the crassness of their own society, and often approvingly cites remarks they make about aspects of American life. H.L. Mencken is quoted with a disparaging remark about Coolidge's social instincts; John Kenneth Galbraith is quoted on the Great Depression; Warren Harding is compared to Sinclair Lewis's literary character George Babbitt. Haven't we all tasted this literary ragout before? Why the need for another helping?

Miller still occasionally surprises with some small story or detail. Sigmund Freud's visit to the United States is discussed in a small section on the psychiatrist's enormous influence in America. I had forgotten about the emergence of so many new skyscrapers in the twenties. And it was fascinating to read about the land mania in Florida. But these interesting sidelines fail to elevate the book above mediocrity. If you haven't read about the 1920s before, you might find this history very interesting, but if you already know a good deal about the decade, this book will add little to your understanding of it.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Roaring Twenties, and Then Some, October 17, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: New World Coming : The 1920s and the Making of Modern America (Hardcover)

America has not had a sweeping popular history of the 1920s since Frederick Allen's "Only Yesterday," published some 70 years ago. Now Miller has surpassed Allen with a book that covers the roaring decade in greater depth, and does it in dancing, supremely readable prose. He brings the 20s alive, with all the jazz, bathtub gin, scandal, Babe Ruth and Hemingway that
have made the period such a favorite for Hollywood. But it was not all laughs and bubbles; Miller reminds us that the KKK was reborn then, and describes its crimes. Radio and air travel were changing the way Americans dealt with each other and the world. Fierce showdowns in mines and factories were redefining relations between capital and labor. Miller makes a convincing case that the political and economic excesses of the booming 20s clearly foreshadowed what has happened in the nation in the decade just past. It's all here, and it's fun to read. It gets an easy five stars.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars New World Coming, May 20, 2007

By 

Frank Pace (PA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: New World Coming: The 1920s And The Making Of Modern America (Paperback)

I just finished this book and it is fast-paced, enjoyable and generally informative. But the authors obvious liberal political bias makes one question his objectivity and accuracy. For example, his comparison of Florence Harding to Hillary Clinton is laughable. Love and desire may have played a role in her decision to "stand by her man' but who can deny that greed and ambition played a larger role.

If one is able ignore the authors snide political interjections, the book is a fun read.