Description
Book Synopsis[A] master class in American cultural and intellectual history. Sarah E. Igo, The New York Times Book Review
Jackson Lears is the preeminent cultural historian of the American empire. This book is another masterpiece in his magisterial corpus. Cornel West
One of Wired''s best books of 2023
A master historian's retrieval of the spiritual visions and vitalisms that animate American life and the possibilities they offer today.
In Animal Spirits, the distinguished historian Jackson Lears explores an alternative American cultural history by tracking the thinkers who championed the individual's spontaneous energies and the idea of a living universe against the strictures of conventional religion, business, and politics. From Puritan times to today, Lears traces ideas and fads such as hypnosis and faith healing from the pulpit and stock exchange to the streets and the betting table. We meet the great prophets of American
