false http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1255702210m/6539321.jpg 6539321 1 A narrative tour de force that combines wide-ranging scholarship with captivating prose, Kevin Starr's acclaimed multi-volume Americans and the California Dream is an unparalleled work of cultural history. In this volume, Starr covers the crucial postwar period--1950 to 1963--when the California we know today first burst into prominence.<br> Starr brilliantly illuminates the dominant economic, social, and cultural forces in California in these pivotal years. In a powerful blend of telling events, colorful personalities, and insightful analyses, Starr examines such issues as the overnight creation of the postwar California suburb, the rise of Los Angeles as Super City, the reluctant emergence of San Diego as one of the largest cities in the nation, and the decline of political centrism. He explores the Silent Generation and the emergent Boomer youth cult, the Beats and the Hollywood "Rat Pack," the pervasive influence of Zen Buddhism and other Asian traditions in art and design, the rise of the University of California and the emergence of California itself as a utopia of higher education, the cooling of West Coast jazz, freeway and water projects of heroic magnitude, outdoor life and the beginnings of the environmental movement. More broadly, he shows how California not only became the most populous state in the Union, but in fact evolved into a mega-state en route to becoming the global commonwealth it is today.<br> Golden Dreams continues an epic series that has been widely recognized for its signal contribution to the history of American culture in California. It is a book that transcends its stated subject to offer a wealth of insight into the growth of the Sun Belt and the West and indeed the dramatic transformation of America itself in these pivotal years following the Second World War. <br> Acclaim for AMERICANS AND THE CALIFORNIA DREAM series<br> "Starr bids fair to become the foremost chronicler of that often fabulous region, imposing upon the dramatic elements of California history a novelist's imagination and a cosmopolitan and sophisticated intelligence."<br> --Philadelphia Inquirer<br> "An impressive book...The grasp is sure, the learning awesome. The prose...has a drive that carries cities and industries and people and decades headlong toward their manifest destiny."<br> --The New York Times<br> "A delightful and extremely thorough chronicle of a state that is almost a mythical kingdom. Nobody who is interested in any of the intellectual currents of American history, or of the roots of twentieth (perhaps even twenty-first) century thought, can fail to enjoy this."<br> --St. Louis Post-Dispatch<br> "For ambition, narrative drive and breadth of research across the disciplines from culture through politics and demography to agronomy and water management, no recent project of American historical writing comes close to Kevin Starr's mammoth, multi-volume 'Americans and the California Dream'.... It is a magnificent accomplishment."<br> --David Rieff, Los Angeles Times Book Review<br> "This is ebullient, nuanced, interdisciplinary history of the grandest kind, drawing parallels and distinctions where perhaps no one ever thought to see them before. Starr's a born storyteller as well, mining a rich seam of anecdotal coal to animate the complex, enigmatic figures of California history.... Starr is an undervalued and irreplaceable public treasure."<br> --David Kipen, San Francisco Chronicle 6731549 10 7 2009 Golden Dreams: California in an Age of Abundance, 1950-1963 (Americans and the California Dream) total:5|5:3|4:1|3:1|2:0|1:0| 5 22 23 2 3 0 false false Sat Aug 08 12:29:50 -0700 2009 Sat Aug 08 12:31:08 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Mon Jul 20 21:28:49 -0700 2009 Mon Jul 20 21:29:04 -0700 2009 5 0 false false Sat Nov 14 05:31:49 -0800 2009 Sat Nov 14 05:31:49 -0800 2009 5 0 false false Thu Nov 12 17:15:55 -0800 2009 Thu Nov 12 17:15:55 -0800 2009 4 0 false false Fri Oct 30 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Fri Oct 30 19:33:46 -0700 2009 Fri Oct 30 19:34:14 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Tue Oct 20 22:20:49 -0700 2009 Tue Oct 20 22:20:49 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Tue Oct 20 13:37:16 -0700 2009 Tue Oct 20 13:37:16 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Sun Oct 18 11:03:44 -0700 2009 Sun Oct 18 11:03:44 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Mon Oct 05 14:16:20 -0700 2009 Mon Oct 05 14:16:20 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Tue Sep 29 09:58:44 -0700 2009 Tue Sep 29 09:58:44 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Mon Sep 21 13:47:36 -0700 2009 Mon Sep 21 13:47:36 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Tue Sep 01 19:58:02 -0700 2009 Wed Sep 30 01:27:06 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Sat Aug 22 14:21:49 -0700 2009 Sat Aug 22 14:21:49 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Tue Aug 18 09:08:54 -0700 2009 Tue Aug 18 09:09:02 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Sun Aug 16 10:53:12 -0700 2009 Sun Aug 16 10:53:12 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Mon Aug 10 21:46:54 -0700 2009 Mon Aug 10 21:46:54 -0700 2009 5 0 false false Fri Jul 31 07:03:12 -0700 2009 Fri Jul 31 07:03:12 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Thu Jul 23 07:16:47 -0700 2009 Tue Oct 27 12:06:44 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Mon Jul 20 23:53:25 -0700 2009 Mon Jul 20 23:53:25 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Mon Jul 20 05:22:04 -0700 2009 Mon Jul 20 05:22:04 -0700 2009 http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=6539321