Fantasyland

How America Went Haywire: A 500-Year History

By: Kurt Andersen

Narrated by: Kurt Andersen

Length: 19 hrs and 35 mins

Publisher's summary

A razor-sharp thinker offers a new understanding of our post-truth world and explains the American instinct to believe in make-believe, from the Pilgrims to P. T. Barnum to Disneyland to zealots of every stripe...to Donald Trump.

In this sweeping, eloquent history of America, Kurt Andersen demonstrates that what's happening in our country today - this strange, post-factual, "fake news" moment we're all living through - is not something entirely new, but rather the ultimate expression of our national character and path. America was founded by wishful dreamers, magical thinkers, and true believers, by impresarios and their audiences, by hucksters and their suckers. Believe-whatever-you-want fantasy is deeply embedded in our DNA.

Over the course of five centuries - from the Salem witch trials to Scientology to the Satanic Panic of the 1980s, from P. T. Barnum to Hollywood and the anything-goes, wild-and-crazy 60s, from conspiracy theories to our fetish for guns and obsession with extraterrestrials - our peculiar love of the fantastic has made America exceptional in a way that we've never fully acknowledged. With the gleeful erudition and tell-it-like-it-is ferocity of a Christopher Hitchens, Andersen explores whether the great American experiment in liberty has gone off the rails.

From the start, our ultra-individualism was attached to epic dreams and epic fantasies - every citizen was free to believe absolutely anything, or to pretend to be absolutely anybody. Little by little, and then more quickly in the last several decades, the American invent-your-own-reality legacy of the Enlightenment superseded its more sober, rational, and empirical parts. We gave ourselves over to all manner of crackpot ideas and make-believe lifestyles designed to console or thrill or terrify us. In Fantasyland, Andersen brilliantly connects the dots that define this condition, portrays its scale and scope, and offers a fresh, bracing explanation of how our American journey has deposited us here.

Fantasyland could not appear at a more perfect moment. If you want to understand the politics and culture of 21st-century America, if you want to know how the lines between reality and illusion have become dangerously blurred, you must listen to this book.

©2017 Kurt Andersen (P)2017 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

"This is an important book - the indispensable book - for understanding America in the age of Trump. It's an eye-opening history filled with brilliant insights, a saga of how we were always susceptible to fantasy, from the Puritan fanatics to the talk-radio and Internet wackos who mix show business, hucksterism, and conspiracy theories." (Walter Isaacson)

"Kurt Andersen is America's voice of reason. What is he - Canadian? The people who should read this book won't - because it's a book - but reality-based citizens will still get a kick out of this winning romp through centuries of American delusion." (Sarah Vowell)

" Fantasyland presents the very best kind of idea - one that, in retrospect, seems obvious, but that took a seer like Kurt Andersen to piece together. The thinking and the writing are both dazzling; it is at once a history lesson and an oh-so-modern cri de coeur; it's an absolute joy to read and will leave your brain dancing with excitement long after you're done." (Stephen Dubner)

Very entertaining but a bit pretentious

Love the logic, pacing, storylines. Hate that the author keeps selecting the most complex language possible to explain a simple concept.

Warning that the author is clearly an atheist and highly dismissive of any religious “fantasy”. I get it - you’re a man of science and must be right - but it gets old.

Regardless I am recommending this entertaining book.

Worth every minute!

And worth a second read/listen. Incredible but very credible & essential synthesis. The author's excellent reading made all the difference.

Provocative, Nuanced and Absorbing

This is a fascinating book. Andersen's research and deft discussion of history within his interesting thesis is extraordinarily well done. The sheer amount of evidence he provides and how well it's interwoven is persuasive. He's also an excellent reader of his own work and is quite sensitive to which words require emphasis to land a point. There were sections (particularly the chapters covering the 1960's) that I couldn't stop listening to they were written and performed so well.

Readers familiar with Andersen's history with Trump (dating back to Spy Magazine) may find a surprising dearth of material here. Although the evolution of political parties is discussed and so is the President, this book is concerned with how fantasy and/or self-delusion are involved with them more than writing about them. A substantial chapter toward the end discusses the Trump presidency and 2016 election in an interesting way.

I put off listening to this for a while because of the length and a lack of certainty and am sorry that I did. Fantasyland made me focus on our culture with a sensitivity I had neglected for some time. More than worthwhile.

Explains a lot!

A fascinating explanation of how present circumstances developed, supported with evidence. Read in eloquent fashion and delivered with aplomb. Engaging and bingeable. Thoroughly enjoyable!

fantasy land alive and well

making sense of a world gone slanted, Kurt Andersen provides a foothold on our now.

Everyone and Anyone

A must read for the global citizen and inner child in all of us, so share this book with everyone and anyone.

Fantastic

should be taught in schools and
should be required reading for all Americans thank you good night

Explains so much.

It has made dealing with daily crazy so much easier. By seeing that these beliefs happen slowly, gives me hope, we can chamge it back slowly.

Thought provoking and eye opening.

Not only does the book highlight the magical thinking that has help create modern America, but challenges us to confront our own fantastic views.

Well thought out and explained.

A love letter to a ex that abused you but you still love intensely. America has been a fantasy prone place since it's inception.
Very enjoyable listen.