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The History of the Future: American Essays
Essays on America’s changing environment from an author who is “funny and searching—a joy to read” (Elizabeth Kolbert).
What does it mean to think about Dallas, the city where JFK was shot, in relationship to Dallas , the show that just seventeen years later made “Who shot J.R.” a national catchphrase?
This collection of essays looks at seven diverse American places and reexamines them in the light of history, experience, and myth. Taking on topics from private streets, racism, and the St. Louis World’s Fair to fracking for oil and digging for dinosaurs in North Dakota boomtowns, this book both warns about the dangers we face as a nation and “explores America in all its beauty and strangeness” (Elizabeth Kolbert, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Sixth Extinction ).
“In his energetic and incisive collection of essays, The History of the Future, McPherson thoughtfully examines seven markedly different American sites. In doing so, he zeros in on the manner in which cultural representation and the pull of nostalgia skewer our self-image at this critical juncture in American history, too often steering us away from our most pressing concerns. His often quirky study reveals the suppressed violence that ravages our communities’ social harmony as well as the environmental balance we so desperately need to preserve.” — St. Louis Post-Dispatch
“Taken together, this travelogue of the familiar and the strange exposes multiple anxieties latent in the national racial inequalities, the dread of disaster, the chase after short-term profits, the eroding meaning of home. McPherson’s depth of research, the inventiveness of his prose, and his sensitivity to municipal undercurrents make this a first-rate work of social analysis.” —Los Angeles Review of Books
“Edward McPherson’s meditations on the United States—from its soaring, vulnerable architecture to its deep underground tunnels—are bracing in their acknowledgment of what’s been lost to time and his anxieties about what’s ahead. This is a smart and beautifully written book about America.” —Rebecca Traister
What does it mean to think about Dallas, the city where JFK was shot, in relationship to Dallas , the show that just seventeen years later made “Who shot J.R.” a national catchphrase?
This collection of essays looks at seven diverse American places and reexamines them in the light of history, experience, and myth. Taking on topics from private streets, racism, and the St. Louis World’s Fair to fracking for oil and digging for dinosaurs in North Dakota boomtowns, this book both warns about the dangers we face as a nation and “explores America in all its beauty and strangeness” (Elizabeth Kolbert, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Sixth Extinction ).
“In his energetic and incisive collection of essays, The History of the Future, McPherson thoughtfully examines seven markedly different American sites. In doing so, he zeros in on the manner in which cultural representation and the pull of nostalgia skewer our self-image at this critical juncture in American history, too often steering us away from our most pressing concerns. His often quirky study reveals the suppressed violence that ravages our communities’ social harmony as well as the environmental balance we so desperately need to preserve.” — St. Louis Post-Dispatch
“Taken together, this travelogue of the familiar and the strange exposes multiple anxieties latent in the national racial inequalities, the dread of disaster, the chase after short-term profits, the eroding meaning of home. McPherson’s depth of research, the inventiveness of his prose, and his sensitivity to municipal undercurrents make this a first-rate work of social analysis.” —Los Angeles Review of Books
“Edward McPherson’s meditations on the United States—from its soaring, vulnerable architecture to its deep underground tunnels—are bracing in their acknowledgment of what’s been lost to time and his anxieties about what’s ahead. This is a smart and beautifully written book about America.” —Rebecca Traister
288 pages, Kindle Edition
Published April 10, 2017
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
October 31, 2018
History should be taught to high school students in the way that McPherson presents it in this collection of essays—he makes the reader understand how the history of a subject is relevant today. He doesn’t overlook popular culture, and he doesn’t overlook the parts of history that are only tangentially related to the subject matter. Because of that, it becomes clear that there is an art to his method. This book is as educational as it is entertaining. And of course, at times it’s infuriating and terrifying. Highly recommend.
February 21, 2021
Excellent essays and perspectives. This is a keeper.
It took me a bit to settle into the writer's cadence of chunks of past/present/past/present, but then it was smooth sailing.
It took me a bit to settle into the writer's cadence of chunks of past/present/past/present, but then it was smooth sailing.
March 26, 2018
The first essay, a history of Dallas intertwined with a history of Dallas, is brilliant. None of the others are as good, and McPherson inserts some self-congratulatory remarks to show his progressive bona fides; he's better writing about fracking than he is about Ferguson and his Monday-morning quarterbacking the use of the atomic bomb is both predictable and myopic. (The quotations he uses are fine but cherry-picked to suit what I assume was his position long before beginning his essay on Los Alamos, which is a shame, because so much of that essay is terrific.) Still, there's no denying the guy can write.
May 11, 2017
Excellent book of essays on topics dealing with the history of the United States from a somewhat social perspective, including the author's own family. I have never read McPherson and didn't know what to expect, but his collection blew me away. Highly recommend this book for essay fans and fans of the author.
December 13, 2017
While I was less interested in the essays about Dallas and about Gettysburg, the rest were great! I especially liked the ones about St. Louis and its forgotten Worlds Fair (and Olympic Games), about the Bakken oil rush, about nuclear weapons, and about the southern California doomsday bunker business.
March 15, 2017
Edward McPherson draws upon the mundane details of the past to try and explain (or at least explore) some of the most significant moments in American history.
What surprised me most about these essays was how well written they are. They each had such a distinct voice. It feels almost intimate. You will not only gain insight into some of the most landmark events in U.S. history, but you also get to learn a great deal about McPherson himself. Highly recommended.
What surprised me most about these essays was how well written they are. They each had such a distinct voice. It feels almost intimate. You will not only gain insight into some of the most landmark events in U.S. history, but you also get to learn a great deal about McPherson himself. Highly recommended.
May 27, 2017
I fell in love with the author after reading his fascinating book "The Backwash Squeeze", and I have since read almost all of his essays and other works. He has such a unique voice for weaving first-person encounters into the history and context of fascinating and often under-reported stories of our nation and culture. I'd recommend this to anyone as it is as enjoyable as it is revealing.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews