“The right book for this time of chaos.”
~The Guardian
From the publisher:
Some of America’s best reporters and thinkers offer an urgent look at a country in chaos in this collection of timely, often prophetic articles from The Atlantic.
The past four years in the United States have been among the most turbulent in our history—and would have been so even without a global pandemic and waves of protest nationwide against police violence. Drawn from the recent work of The Atlantic staff writers and contributors, The American Crisis explores the factors that led us to the present moment: racial division, economic inequality, political dysfunction, the hollowing out of government, the devaluation of truth, and the unique threat posed by Donald Trump. Today’s emergencies expose pathologies years in the making.
Featuring leading voices from The Atlantic, one of the country’s most widely read and influential magazines, The American Crisis is a broad and essential look at the condition of America today—and at the qualities of national character that may yet offer hope.
Order now: Amazon | B & N | Books-a-Million | Bookshop | Simon & Schuster
Reviews
“In keeping with the Atlantic’s goal of ‘debating and illuminating America’s meaning and purpose,’ editor at large Murphy gathers 40 incisive essays from an impressive roster of contributors. ‘How did we get here?’ editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg asks in his introduction. ‘How did our politics become so appalling and dispiriting? How did a system meant to elevate the most qualified among us instead place a grifter in Lincoln’s house? How did the gaps between rich and poor, men and women, black and white, immigrant and American-born, become so profound?’ The essays are grouped into four sections: the first looks at ‘underlying conditions of society as a whole that have been deteriorating for decades.’ The second examines the failure of politics; the third covers the disastrous Trump presidency; and the last focuses on the possibility for the nation’s reinvention. Contributors consider issues such as racial inequality, cultural divides and polarization, climate change, voter suppression, the plight of undocumented immigrants, and evangelical Christians, who regard themselves, ‘hysterically and with self-pity, as an oppressed minority that requires a strongman to rescue it.’ Former Harvard president Drew Gilpin Faust melds history with a memoir of her childhood in Virginia, ‘a world in which silences distorted lives, and falsehoods perpetuated structures of power rooted in centuries of injustice.’ In a moving portrait of a Baltimore resident struggling with health problems, staff writer Olga Khazan sees that ‘America’s racist and segregationist history continues to harm black people in the most intimate of ways—seeping into their lungs, their blood, even their DNA.’ Caitlin Flanagan rails against rich parents’ sense of entitlement, which she experienced firsthand as a guidance counselor at a tony prep school. Among many unsettling pieces are profiles of Newt Gingrich, Paul Manafort, Ivanka Trump, and, most disturbingly, conspiracy theorists enraptured with QAnon. Other top-notch contributors include Anne Applebaum, George Packer, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Ibram X. Kendi, and Yuval Noah Harari. An illuminating collection of perceptive, well-argued, and compelling essays.”
~Kirkus Reviews, September 15, 2020
“The American Crisis is a 500-page collection of the best of the Atlantic magazine in the age of Trump. With contributions from three dozen marquee names in US journalism, including Ta-Nehisi Coates, Anne Applebaum, Angela Nagle, Franklin Foer, Adam Serwer, George Packer and Megan Garber – plus some notable non-journalists like Lin-Manuel Miranda – it bulges with great writing and reporting.
“In an era when the public square has been degraded by the mob violence of Twitter, the amoral algorithms of Facebook and the dubious scribblings of Drudge, Breitbart and the Daily Caller, this collection arrives at the perfect moment to affirm the promise of the Atlantic’s founders in 1857: to fight with the forces of ‘freedom, national progress, and honor, whether public or private.’”
~The Guardian, October 3, 2020