An astute examination of loneliness and isolation that sheds light, finds humor, and provides hope.
A cultural anthropologist offers his take on America’s self-reliant culture.
According to Richardson, some key traits lodged in the American ethos, such as self-reliance and maintaining privacy, seem positive but have contributed to increasing widespread isolation; trauma lessens when burdens are shared as a group, but too often Americans are expected to find their own solutions. Sally, a participant in the author’s study, is a nurse mourning the tragic death of her sister. (Richardson uses research gleaned from a sampling of older Americans aged 45-74.) Her co-workers ignored Sally’s unhappiness until her volatile emotions began to affect her job performance. By comparison, Richardson’s adopted South Indian community (he spent time in the region conducting fieldwork as a student) gave immediate “comfort and censure” to a man who had developed a drinking problem, seeing his issue as the group’s responsibility. Family ties in modern America are weak and distant compared to earlier time periods and other cultures, the author asserts. Canada’s Nêhiyawak people have 17 terms related to varieties of cousins; in the U.S., most people have little contact with any cousins at all. Richardson observes that even minor-seeming issues, such as the ways we eat and have fun, contribute to societal disconnection. With abundant specialized diets (e.g., gluten-free or vegan) available to them and unlimited access to snacks, family members and friends often eat separately rather than sharing meal times. Recreation is a healthy respite from work, but the idea of fun has shifted—rather than involving social interactions, amusement now often falls to streaming platforms like Netflix, viewed alone. Richardson effectively uses humor and personal anecdotes—his dad becomes an ongoing joke—and the book’s charts and graphs are mostly easy to read. The author’s message that we need more collectivism to be healthy again is daunting for an individualistic society, but Richardson also provides glimmers of hope; for example, Gen Z seems to be a more collaborative generation than its predecessors, and Americans are seeking mental health treatment more often.
An astute examination of loneliness and isolation that sheds light, finds humor, and provides hope.Pub Date: May 17, 2024
ISBN: 9798988768005
Page Count: 434
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: March 28, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.
Words that made a nation.
Isaacson is known for expansive biographies of great thinkers (and Elon Musk), but here he pens a succinct, stimulating commentary on the Founding Fathers’ ode to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” His close reading of the Declaration of Independence’s second sentence, published to mark the 250th anniversary of the document’s adoption, doesn’t downplay its “moral contradiction.” Thomas Jefferson enslaved hundreds of people yet called slavery “a cruel war against human nature” in his first draft of the Declaration. All but 15 of the document’s 56 signers owned enslaved people. While the sentence in question asserted “all men are created equal” and possess “unalienable rights,” the Founders “consciously and intentionally” excluded women, Native Americans, and enslaved people. And yet the sentence is powerful, Isaacson writes, because it names a young nation’s “aspirations.” He mounts a solid defense of what ought to be shared goals, among them economic fairness, “moral compassion,” and a willingness to compromise. “Democracy depends on this,” he writes. Isaacson is excellent when explaining how Enlightenment intellectuals abroad influenced the founders. Benjamin Franklin, one of the Declaration’s “five-person drafting committee,” stayed in David Hume’s home for a month in the early 1770s, “discussing ideas of natural rights” with the Scottish philosopher. Also strong is Isaacson’s discussion of the “edits and tweaks” made to Jefferson’s draft. As recommended by Franklin and others, the changes were substantial, leaving Jefferson “distraught.” Franklin, who emerges as the book’s hero, helped establish municipal services, founded a library, and encouraged religious diversity—the kind of civic-mindedness that we could use more of today, Isaacson reminds us.
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.Pub Date: Nov. 18, 2025
ISBN: 9781982181314
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
PERSPECTIVES
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