November 06, 2009

Books

Facing the Music

Dancing in the DarkA Cultural History of the Great DepressionMorris Dickstein W. W. Norton, $29.95, 624 pp.

David Castronovo

Many a baby boomer was raised on tales of the Great Depression, tales of sharecroppers, breadlines, NRA parades, and sparing a dime for a brother in need. These often played a bigger part in our lives than Dr. Spock. My mother, who learned about John Steinbeck’s work from a savvy nun at a Brooklyn high school, regarded the depiction of the Joad family’s struggle in The Grap (...)


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about the writer

David Castronovo is the author of many books of literary and cultural criticism, his latest being Blokes: The Bad Boys of English Literature. He is C. Richard Pace Professor at Pace University in New York City.

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