1968
The Rise and Fall of the New American Revolution
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- $44.99
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- $44.99
Publisher Description
The year 1968 retains its mythic hold on the imagination in America and around the world. Like the revolutionary years 1789, 1848, 1871, 1917, and 1989, it is recalled most of all as a year when revolution beckoned or threatened. On the 50th anniversary of that tumultuous year, cultural historians Robert Cottrell and Blaine T. Browne provide a well-informed, up-to-date synthesis of the events that rocked the world, emphasizing the revolutionary possibilities more fully than previous books. For a time, it seemed as if anything were possible, that utopian visions could be borne out in the political, cultural, racial, or gender spheres. It was the year of the Tet Offensive, the Resistance, the Ultra-Resistance, the New Politics, Chavez and RFK breaking bread, LBJ’s withdrawal, student revolt, barricades in Paris, the Prague Spring, SDS’ sharp turn leftward, communes, the American Indian Movement, the Beatles’ “Revolution,” the Stones’ “Street Fighting Man,” The Population Bomb, protest at the Miss America pageant, and Black Power at the Mexico City Olympics. 1968 was also the year of My Lai, the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy, Warsaw Pact tanks in Czechoslovakia, the police riot in Chicago, the Tlatelolco massacre, Reagan’s belated bid, Wallace’s American Independent Party campaign, “Love It or Leave It,” and the backlash that set the stage, at year’s end, for Richard Milhous Nixon’s ascendancy to the White House. For those readers reliving 1968 or exploring it for the first time, Cottrell and Browne serve as insightful guides, weaving the events together into a powerful narrative of an America and a world on the brink.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
History professors Cottrell (Sex, Drugs, and Rock 'n' Roll) and Browne (Uncertain Order: The World in the Twentieth Century) deliver a well-written chronicle of 1968, one of the most tumultuous years in modern history. In the U.S., 1968 was dominated by the divisive Vietnam War and the protests it generated, history-changing assassinations, the 1968 Democratic Convention that nominated Hubert Humphrey over antiwar candidate Eugene McCarthy, the subsequent election of Richard Nixon, the black power movement, and the general cultural upheaval that presaged the women's liberation and gay rights movements. Cottrell and Browne also describe political upheavals in other parts of the world, such as leftist movements in France; Italy; and Czechoslovakia, where the government's liberalizing efforts ended with the Soviet Union's invasion. The authors skillfully place events in context, capturing the tragic dimensions of the John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. assassinations and their political aftermaths, the destabilizing effect of the North Vietnamese Army's Tet Offensive on American resolve, and the drama of the televised clashes between the Chicago Police Department and protesters during the Democratic Convention. The writing is strong, and the retrospective view will appeal to both baby boomers who experienced the year's relentless challenges and younger readers who wish to understand how the events of 1968 changed the direction of American society.
