Fantasyland

How America Went Haywire: A 500-Year History

By: Kurt Andersen

Narrated by: Kurt Andersen

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “The single most important explanation, and the fullest explanation, of how Donald Trump became president of the United States . . . nothing less than the most important book that I have read this year.”—Lawrence O’Donnell

How did we get here?

In this sweeping, eloquent history of America, Kurt Andersen shows that what’s happening in our country today—this post-factual, “fake news” moment we’re all living through—is not something new, but rather the ultimate expression of our national character. America was founded by wishful dreamers, magical thinkers, and true believers, by hucksters and their suckers. 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 sixties, from conspiracy theories to our fetish for guns and obsession with extraterrestrials—our love of the fantastic has made America exceptional in a way that we've never fully acknowledged. 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. 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.

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

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE

“This is a blockbuster of a book. Take a deep breath and dive in.”—Tom Brokaw

“[An] absorbing, must-read polemic . . . a provocative new study of America’s cultural history.”—Newsday

“Compelling and totally unnerving.”—The Village Voice

“A frighteningly convincing and sometimes uproarious picture of a country in steep, perhaps terminal decline that would have the founding fathers weeping into their beards.”—The Guardian

“This is an important book—the indispensable book—for understanding America in the age of Trump.”—Walter Isaacson, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Leonardo da Vinci

Critic reviews

“With this rousing book, [Kurt] Andersen proves to be the kind of clear-eyed critic an anxious country needs in the midst of a national crisis.”—San Francisco Chronicle

“A frighteningly convincing and sometimes uproarious picture of a country in steep, perhaps terminal decline that would have the founding fathers weeping into their beards.”—The Guardian

“A spirited, often entertaining rant against things as they are.”—Kirkus Reviews

“A provocative new study of America’s cultural history . . . In this absorbing, must-read polemic, Andersen exhaustively chronicles a development eating away at the very foundation of Americanism.”—Newsday

“Andersen exhaustively explores with wit and extensive research.”—HuffPost

“A staggering amount of research that’s both compelling and totally unnerving.”—The Village Voice

“A stunning, sweeping explanation of how we got to Trump . . . the most important book that I have read this year.”—Lawrence O’Donnell, MSNBC

“This is a blockbuster of a book. Kurt Andersen is a dazzling writer and a perceptive student of the many layers of American life. Take a deep breath and dive in.”—Tom Brokaw

“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. Even the parts you think you know already are put into an eye-opening context.”—Walter Isaacson, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Leonardo da Vinci

“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.