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This book presents three decades of writings by one of Americas most distinguished historians. John Higham, renowned for his influential works on immigration, ethnicity, political symbolism, and the writing of history, here traces the changing contours of American culture since its beginnings, focusing on the ways that an extraordinarily mobile society has allowed divergent ethnic, class, and ideological groups to hang together as Americans.The book includes classic essays by Higham and more recent writings, some of which have been substantially revised for this publication. Topics range widely from the evolution of American national symbols and the fate of our national character to new perspectives on the New Deal, on other major turning points, and on changes in race relations after major American wars. Yet they are unified by an underlying theme: that a heterogeneous society and an inclusive national culture need each other.

In the aftermath of debate about the death of literary theory, Austin E. Quigley asks whether theory has failed us or we have failed literary theory. Theory can thrive, he argues, only if we understand how it can be strategically deployed to reveal what it does not presuppose. This involves the repositioning of theoretical inquiry relative to historical and critical inquiry and the repositioning of theories relative to each other.What follows is a thought-provoking reexamination of the controversial claims of pluralism in literary studies. The book explores the related roles of literary history, criticism, and theory by tracing the fascinating history of linguistics as an intellectual problem in the twentieth century. Quigley’s approach clarifies the pluralistic nature of literary inquiry, the viability and life cycles of theories, the controversial status of canonicity, and the polemical nature of the culture wars by positioning them all in the context of recurring debates about language that have their earliest exemplifications in classical times.

Jay Hopler's Green Squall is the winner of the 2005 Yale Series of Younger Poets competition. As Louise Glck observes in her foreword, Green Squall begins and ends in the garden; however, Hoplers gardens are not of the seasonal variety evoked by poets of the English lyrichis gardens flourish at lower, fiercer latitudes and in altogether different mindscapes. There is a darkness in Hoplers work as deep and brutal as any in American poetry. Though his verbal extravagance and formal invention bring to mind Wallace Stevenss tropical extrapolations, there lies beneath Green Squalls lush tropical surfaces a terrifying world in which nightmare and celebration are indistinguishable, and hope is synonymous with despair.

Repeatedly in the twentieth century, the United States has been involved in confrontations with other countries, each with the potential for widespread international and domestic upheaval, even disaster. In this book Michael Hunt focuses on seven such crises, presenting for each an illuminating introduction and a rich collection of original documents. His epilogue considers the nature of international crises and the U.S. record in dealing with them.The case studies include:the American entry into World War I the Japanese-American rivalry that led to Pearl Harborthe origins of the U.S.-Soviet Cold Warthe collision between China and the United States during the Korean Warthe confrontation over Soviet missiles in CubaLyndon Johnsons commitment to war in Vietnamand the American entanglement in the Iranian revolutionThe studies allow the reader to see U.S. foreign policymaking firsthand and to understand it as something that is shaped by interactions with other nations and leaders as well as by American values, attitudes, and needs. To provide an international perspective, both the narrative and the documents give as much attention to foreign policymakers as to their American counterparts, emphasizing the invariably dynamic, often confused, and sometimes chaotic interaction between the two sides.

In this insightful book, which is a revisionist math history as well as a revisionist art history, Tony Robbin, well known for his innovative computer visualizations of hyperspace, investigates different models of the fourth dimension and how these are applied in art and physics. Robbin explores the distinction between the slicing, or Flatland, model and the projection, or shadow, model. He compares the history of these two models and their uses and misuses in popular discussions. Robbin breaks new ground with his original argument that Picasso used the projection model to invent cubism, and that Minkowski had four-dimensional projective geometry in mind when he structured special relativity. The discussion is brought to the present with an exposition of the projection model in the most creative ideas about space in contemporary mathematics such as twisters, quasicrystals, and quantum topology. Robbin clarifies these esoteric concepts with understandable drawings and diagrams.Robbin proposes that the powerful role of projective geometry in the development of current mathematical ideas has been long overlooked and that our attachment to the slicing model is essentially a conceptual block that hinders progress in understanding contemporary models of spacetime. He offers a fascinating review of how projective ideas are the source of some of today’s most exciting developments in art, math, physics, and computer visualization.

This carefully considered book is a welcome addition to the debate over judicial activism. Constitutional scholar Kermit Roosevelt III offers an elegantly simple way to resolve the heated discord between conservatives, who argue that the Constitution is immutable, and progressives, who insist that it is a living document that must be reinterpreted in new cultural contexts so that its meaning evolves. Roosevelt uses plain language and compelling examples to explain how the Constitution can be both a constant and an organic document.Recent years have witnessed an increasing drumbeat of complaints about judicial behavior, focusing particularly on Supreme Court decisions that critics charge are reflections of the Justices political preferences rather than enforcement of the Constitution. The author takes a balanced look at these controversial decisions through a compelling new lens of constitutional interpretation. He clarifies the task of the Supreme Court in constitutional cases, then sets out a model to describe how the Court creates doctrine to implement the meaning of the Constitution. Finally, Roosevelt uses this model to show which decisions can be justified as legitimate and which cannot.

Popularly known during his lifetime as “The World’s Greatest Living Composer,” Igor Stravinsky (1882–1971) not only wrote some of the twentieth century’s most influential music, he also assumed the role of cultural icon. This book reveals Stravinsky’s two sides—the public persona, preoccupied with his own image and place in history, and the private composer, whose views and beliefs were often purposely suppressed. Charles M. Joseph draws a richer and more human portrait of Stravinsky than anyone has done before, using an array of unpublished materials and unreleased film trims from the composer’s huge archive at the Paul Sacher Institute in Switzerland.Focusing on Stravinsky’s place in the culture of the twentieth century, Joseph situates the composer among the giants of his age. He discusses Stravinsky’s first American commission, his complicated relationship with his son, his professional relationships with celebrities ranging from T. S. Eliot to Orson Welles, his flirtations with Hollywood and television, and his love-hate attitude toward the critics and the media. In a close look at Stravinsky’s efforts to mold a public image, Joseph explores the complex dance between the composer and his artistic collaborator, Robert Craft, who orchestrated controversial efforts to protect Stravinsky and edit materials about him, both during the composer’s lifetime and after his death.