This collection of 31 essays by Lewis H. Lapham scrutinizes our national pathology of greed and self-aggrandizement. Lapham concludes that we have engaged in a dissolute foreign policy, suffered a general loss of courage, humor, and clearmindedness, and made a steady retreat from the idea of democracy.
Lewis H. Lapham (1935–2024) authored more than a dozen books. He ran Harper's Magazine for nearly three decades, serving as editor from 1976 to 1981 and from 1983 to 2006, and regularly contributed columns and essays that were compared to the work of Michel de Montaigne, Mark Twain, and H. L. Mencken. Lapham was also the founder and editor of Lapham's Quarterly.
