Civilization in the United States: An Inquiry by Thirty Americans

In the turbulent aftermath of the Great War, thirty of America's most prominent intellectuals gathered to ask a dangerous question: what is American civilization, and is it worth preserving? This landmark collection, edited by Harold Stearns, represents a collective act of national introspection undertaken at a moment when the promise of America seemed deeply uncertain. The contributors, ranging from journalists to scholars to poets, examine everything from the American obsession with money to the nation's spiritual emptiness, from the hybrid nature of American identity to the troubling gap between the nation's founding ideals and its actual practices. Some essays excoriate American culture with savage wit; others trace the country's peculiar anxieties to their roots. What unites them is a shared conviction that honest criticism serves the nation better than patriotic self-concealment. The result is a remarkable time capsule of early 20th-century American thought, capturing an era's fears about modernity, immigration, industrialism, and the uncertain future of a civilization still defining itself. For readers interested in American intellectual history, the Lost Generation, or the long tradition of American self-criticism, this volume remains a fascinating and often startling document.