On Paradise Drive: How We Live Now (And Always Have) in the Future Tense [Englisch] [Gebundene Ausgabe]

Brooks, whose Bobos in Paradise (2001) focused on America's upper class, continues his offbeat examination of modern culture by examining the middle class. Life in the middle isn't what it used to be, Brooks reports. Whereas the word suburb once conjured up images of bland homogeneity, it now means "lesbian dentists, Iranian McMansions, Korean megachurches, nuclear-free-zone subdevelopments, Orthodox shtetls with Hasidic families walking past strip malls on their way to Saturday-morning shul." Where we live, Brooks says, is no longer our destination; it's a "dot on the flowing plane of multidirectional movement." Today's middle class is constantly in motion, always looking forward, planning its future. As a satiric social commentator, Brooks is always looking for the humorous anomaly--there are more than 600 certified pet chiropractors in the U.S.--but along with exposing cultural absurdities, he offers acute observations on middle-class life, and he frequently takes us in previously unexplored philosophical directions. One way or the other, this book will give readers plenty of new things to think about. David Pitt
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"An absolute sparkler of a book, which should establish David Brooks--not that he needs establishing--as "the smart, fun-to-read social critic of his generation."

Take a look at Americans in their natural habitat: men shopping for barbecue grills, doing that special walk men do when in the presence of hardware; super-efficient football mums who chair school auctions, organise the PTAs, and weigh less than their kids; and suburban chain restaurants, the Hard Rock Outback Cantina etc. Are they, or we, as the western world gradually becomes more and more similar, as shallow we look? Many around the world see America as the great bimbo. Naturally, they work hard and are energetic, but is that because they are money-hungry and don't know how to relax? David Brooks probes deeper, and explains that they behave the way they do because they live under the spell of paradise. Aren't we all? The inheritors of a sense of limitless possibilities, raised to think in the future tense and to strive toward the happiness we naturally accept, the fulfilment of our dreams.

Take a look at Americans in their natural habitat: men shopping for barbecue grills, doing that special walk men do when in the presence of hardware; super-efficient football mums who chair school auctions, organise the PTAs, and weigh less than their kids; and suburban chain restaurants, the Hard Rock Outback Cantina etc. Are they, or we, as the western world gradually becomes more and more similar, as shallow we look? Many around the world see America as the great bimbo. Naturally, they work hard and are energetic, but is that because they are money-hungry and don't know how to relax? David Brooks probes deeper, and explains that they behave the way they do because they live under the spell of paradise. Aren't we all? The inheritors of a sense of limitless possibilities, raised to think in the future tense and to strive toward the happiness we naturally accept, the fulfilment of our dreams.

David Brooks is a senior editor at THE WEEKLY STANDARD and a contributing editor at NEWSWEEK. Formerly a reporter and editor at THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, he's had articles in THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE WASHINGTON POST and other publications.