Trying to Be Cool: Growing Up in the 1950s, Based on a True Story

by Leo Braudy

"A lovely and passionate evocation of a time and place and the evanescent self we all inhabit." - T.C. BOYLE

"I love this book. The irony of Trying To Be Cool is that the book is so damn cool. It's Rock Around the Clock for smart people. Leo Braudy captures an American moment. This book distills and extrapolates at once. Braudy can play lead and rhythm at the same time." - PERCIVAL EVERETT

Philadelphia in the '50 Barson's Soda Shop at 60th and Cedar was the center of the universe, hanging out was the point, and the height of cool was to be kicked out of the Cedar Theatre for public displays of passion. In this engaging memoir of teenage life amid the transformations of post-World War II America, Leo Braudy reveals his younger self as a somewhat clueless narrator in the throes of deciphering the innuendo and subterfuge of a confusing world. Was rock 'n' roll really a Communist plot? Was "juvenile delinquency" actually a threat to social order? Was "conformity" truly the era's norm? Weaving a personal narrative through the wider social context of disillusionment and apocalyptic fears, Trying To Be Cool reveals the vibrant eclecticism of a decade too often dismissed as a period of conventionality.

Genres: Memoir, History

269 pages, Paperback

First published October 21, 2013

About the author

Leo Braudy is among America's leading cultural historians and film critics. He currently is University Professor and Leo S. Bing Chair in English and American Literature at the University of Southern California. He lives in Los Angeles.

Reviews

[Donna · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was looking for information about being a teen in the 1950s from a boy's point of view and this book was perfect. At the very end Leo states his purpose and he succeeded grandly:

My purpose instead is to bear witness, to try to recapture the experience of growing up in a particular time and place that might otherwise vanish from history.

The memoir was enjoyable to read, but sometimes his memory trail would take more twists and turns than I could easily follow. Suddenly he would pick up a thread I had completely forgotten about and I would realize that it was the major point of the chapter. But memories are like that and I am glad this book is out there to record this little piece of history in a unique way. If you are nostalgic or curious about this time in history, it is a good memoir to read.

[Dj · Rating 3 out of 5]

I expected this book to be either a satirical view of the 1950s, or a historical perspective of the baby boomers. It wasn't really either one-instead, Braudy made it a blend of the two, and took great pains to point out it was from a Jewish viewpoint.

Did it work? Ehh, not really. While I enjoy the injection of history into books (I love it, actually), Braudy made it more just a bit dry. Instead of interspersing history throughout the book, he would start a chapter with a story about his boyhood, then interrupt it with a 10 page diatribe about some of the history of the 50's-60s. I felt it disrupted the flow of the book, making it difficult to remember what the original point of the beginning of the chapter was.

Still, the book is not without merit. Discussions of dating rituals and comparisons by boys of certain anatomical items gave the book humor and energy. The topic itself is fascinating...the 50s were such an interesting point of time, right after WWII and directly before Vietnam (and part of the Cold War). I would guess anyone who grew up during this period of time would like the book. As for the rest of us, it is an ok read.

[Teresa · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Braudy is a cultural historian and it shows-he writes intelligently and passionately about being a teenager in the first generation have teenagers. It's easy, nowadays, to see the 1950s as cheesy, conservative, and naïve and in some ways, yeah, Braudy did not disabuse me of this notion but I grew fascinated by his dissection of what makes 'cool'."
read more: http://likeiamfeasting.blogspot.gr/20...

[Windi · Rating 5 out of 5]

I want to know about this book,