400 Years of Drinking in America

By: Susan Cheever, The Great Courses

Narrated by: Susan Cheever

America’s relationship with alcohol is a fraught and inconsistent one. While many other nations and cultures have stable attitudes toward drinking, the American perspective on alcohol has been volatile, vacillating wildly from the gallon-a-day beer rations on the Mayflower to nationwide prohibition and back again. Why are Americans so ambivalent about alcohol? What can we learn about the past and the American character through these extreme fluctuations between alcoholism and sobriety across the centuries?

Join author Susan Cheever to explore 400 Years of Drinking in America. Across six lectures, Susan will trace the ever-changing attitudes toward alcohol in the United States, beginning with the colonists and tracing the patterns of habits and opinions to the rise of a thriving rehab industry in the 21st century. As you explore the ebb and flow of drinking in America, you’ll revisit moments that were deeply impacted by our complex relationship with alcohol.

The Pilgrims embraced beer while the Puritans wrestled with the sin of excessive drinking. The major wars fought on American soil were sometimes fueled as much by alcohol as by patriotism. Prohibition produced a generation of famously drunken writers and artists. From “the drunkest country in the world” to Alcoholics Anonymous, you’ll see what America’s love-hate relationship with booze can tell us about the growing pains of a young nation and the complexities of a diverse and ever-changing society.

©2025 Audible Originals, LLC (P)2025 Audible Originals, LLC.

Hemingway drank mojitos? WTH?

It’s a good take on alcoholism and its effect on literature.
Unfortunately I can relate to being an alcoholic. This is good. One correction I must submit is that Bill Wilson and Bob Smith, MD started AA.

Loved it!

What a great lesson didn’t expect it to be that good and for somebody who is newly sober it was awesome just to see how alcohol has been in our lives creating havoc for 400 hundred years

Surprising Information

Well paced presentation. Up to date facts and logical analysis. Well researched and beautifully presented.

Mostly about reasons not to drink, not history

Well written and interesting, only one chapter is about the effects alcohol has had on American history.

Did not expect a long Newsweek /Time magazine article

The first 1 1/2 chapters are not too bad but after that, the entertainment decreases and the sermonizing dramatically increases. The narration is flat and further detracts from the narrative