How gallows humor can bolster us to confront global warming We’ve all seen the headlines: oceans rising, historic heat waves, mass extinctions, climate refugees. It feels overwhelming, like nothing can make a difference in combating this ongoing global catastrophe. How can we mobilize to save the world when we feel this depressed? Stay Cool enjoins us to laugh our way forward. Human beings have used comedy to cope with difficult realities since the beginning of recorded time—the more dismal the news, the darker the humor. Using this rich tradition of dark comedy to investigate climate change, Aaron Sachs makes the case that gallows humor, a mainstay of African Americans and Jews facing extraordinary oppression, can cultivate endurance, persistence, and solidarity in the face of calamity. Sachs surveys the macabre tradition of laughing during great suffering, from the Black Plague to the San Francisco earthquake of 1906—and offers some of the earliest examples of superlative dark comedy. He also explores how a new generation of activists and comedians are deploying dark humor to great effect, by poking fun at older people’s apathy about climate catastrophes, lambasting oil corporations’ “eco” rebranding, and even producing an off-Broadway dystopian comedy called “Sea Level Rise.” Sachs offers suggestions for how environmentalists can use dark comedy first to boost their own morale, and then to reframe their activism in more energizing and relatable ways. Environmentalism is probably the least funny social movement that’s ever existed. Stay Cool seeks to change that. Will comedy save the world? Not by itself, no. But it can put people in a decent enough mood to get them started on a rescue mission.
A double portrait of two of America’s most influential writers that reveals the surprising connections between them—and their uncanny relevance to our age of crisis Up from the Depths tells the interconnected stories of two of the most important writers in American history—the novelist and poet Herman Melville (1819–1891) and one of his earliest biographers, the literary critic and historian Lewis Mumford (1895–1990). Deftly cutting back and forth between the writers, Aaron Sachs reveals the surprising resonances between their lives, work, and troubled times—and their uncanny relevance in our own age of crisis. The author of Moby-Dick was largely forgotten for several decades after his death, but Mumford helped spearhead Melville’s revival in the aftermath of World War I and the 1918–1919 flu pandemic, when American culture needed a forebear with a suitably dark vision. As Mumford’s career took off and he wrote books responding to the machine age, urban decay, world war, and environmental degradation, it was looking back to Melville’s confrontation with crises such as industrialization, slavery, and the Civil War that helped Mumford to see his own era clearly. Mumford remained obsessed with Melville, ultimately helping to canonize him as America’s greatest tragedian. But largely forgotten today is one of Mumford’s key insights—that Melville’s darkness was balanced by an inspiring determination to endure. Amid today’s foreboding over global warming, racism, technology, pandemics, and other crises, Melville and Mumford remind us that we’ve been in this struggle for a long time. To rediscover these writers today is to rediscover how history can offer hope in dark times.
Perhaps America's best environmental idea was not the national park but the garden cemetery, a use of space that quickly gained popularity in the mid-nineteenth century. Such spaces of repose brought key elements of the countryside into rapidly expanding cities, making nature accessible to all and serving to remind visitors of the natural cycles of life. In this unique interdisciplinary blend of historical narrative, cultural criticism, and poignant memoir, Aaron Sachs argues that American cemeteries embody a forgotten landscape tradition that has much to teach us in our current moment of environmental crisis. Until the trauma of the Civil War, many Americans sought to shape society into what they thought of as an Arcadia--not an Eden where fruit simply fell off the tree, but a public garden that depended on an ethic of communal care, and whose sense of beauty and repose related directly to an acknowledgement of mortality and limitation. Sachs explores the notion of Arcadia in the works of nineteenth-century nature writers, novelists, painters, horticulturists, landscape architects, and city planners, and holds up for comparison the twenty-first century's--and his own--tendency toward denial of both death and environmental limits. His far-reaching insights suggest new possibilities for the environmental movement today and new ways of understanding American history.
A masterly and beautifully written account of the impact of Alexander von Humboldt on nineteenth-century American history and culture The naturalist and explorer Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859) achieved unparalleled fame in his own time. Today, however, he and his enormous legacy to American thought are virtually unknown. In The Humboldt Current, Aaron Sachs traces Humboldt's pervasive influence on American history through examining the work of four explorers—J. N. Reynolds, Clarence King, George Wallace, and John Muir—who embraced Humboldt's idea of a "chain of connection" uniting all peoples and all environments. A skillful blend of narrative and interpretation that also discusses Humboldt's influence on Emerson, Whitman, Thoreau, Melville, and Poe, The Humboldt Current offers a colorful, passionate, and superbly written reinterpretation of nineteenth-century American history.
Cornell University history and American studies professor Aaron Sachs offers a masterly intellectual history of the impact of 19th-century explorer Alexander von Humboldt on American culture and science.
The naturalist and explorer Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859) achieved unparalleled fame in his own time. Today, however, he and his enormous legacy to American thought are virtually unknown. In The Humboldt Current, Aaron Sachs traces Humboldt's pervasive influence on American history through examining the work of four explorers--J.N. Reynolds, Clarence King, George Wallace, and John Muir--who embraced Humboldt's idea of a "chain of connection" uniting all peoples and all environments. A skillful blend of narrative and interpretation that also discusses Humboldt's influence on Emerson, Whitman, Thoreau, Melville, and Poe, The Humboldt Currentoffers a colorful, passionate, and superbly written reinterpretation of nineteenth-century American history.
The naturalist & explorer Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859) achieved unparalleled fame in his own time, particularly in the U.S. Here, Sachs traces Humboldt¿s influence on Amer. history, specifically looking at the lives & careers of several 19th-cent. explorers who used Humboldt¿s notion of ¿unity in diversity¿ & his spirit of exploration to develop a critique of their increasingly industrialized society. Includes: J. N. Reynolds, who explored the South Seas from 1829 to 1831; Clarence King, first dir. of the U.S. Geol. Survey; George Melville, Arctic explorer & chief engineer of the U.S. Navy; & John Muir, explorer of Alaska & Siberia. Discusses the Amer. writers & artists indebted to Humboldt, incl. Emerson, Whitman, Thoreau, Melville, Poe, & Frederic Church.
Where does poverty come from? What am I supposed to do about it?" These questions are driving a new generation of Christians to take action on behalf of the poor through social and political action, global partnerships, and financial generosity, as they desire to become the generation that ends poverty forever. But in pursuit of this goal, they risk losing sight of a fundamental reality: the root cause of poverty isn't found in material or external circumstances. The root cause of poverty is sin--and sin is not a problem we can solve. But Jesus can. In Awaiting a Savior, Aaron Armstrong reminds readers that even as we are responsible for pursuing biblical solutions to poverty, our hope for truly resolving it comes not from the good we do, but from the return of Christ, who will once and for all put an end to sin, suffering and death as he brings about the new creation.
Discover the formula used by twenty-one of the world’s most extraordinary leaders to make consistent and smart decisions. How do the wise decide and lead businesses and organizations to great success is the question Bryn Zeckhauser and Aaron Sandoski posed to themselves after landing their first jobs as managers. Despite the best training the world could offer—Harvard MBAs and stints at McKinsey & Company, the elite powerhouse consulting firm—they felt unprepared when faced with the pressure to make critical decisions. So they set out on a three-year quest to discover how people with remarkable success and experience in both corporate and public life—“the wise”—went about making crucial, often make-or-break decisions. • How did William George, when CEO of Medtronic, get the real story about why a critical tool used by cardiologists was failing and use that information to fix a systemic problem within the company? • When inventor Dean Kamen has to make a decision about investing in a new technology, why does he find it useful to “fill a room with barbarians” to get the best thinking from his team? • How did Shelly Lazarus assess the risks of making a nontraditional career move, a decision that eventually led her to being appointed CEO? • How did Stephen Schwarzman and Peter Peterson, the founders of The Blackstone Group, turn $400,000 of their own money into one of the world’s preeminent alternative asset managers with $100 billion under management? These and the other accounts of the direct conversations Zeckhauser and Sandoski had with twenty-one major leaders show that between wise decisions and poor ones lie vast fortunes and extraordinary contrasts in success. How the Wise Decide distills their wisdom, and it reveals how you can use this wisdom to be on the winning side of the ledger.
In the spirit of Tracy Kidder’s Mountains Beyond Mountains, and joining the ranks of works by Bryan Stevenson, Matthew Desmond, Abraham Verghese and Oliver Sachs, the inspiring story of a young American neurologist’s struggle to make a difference in Haiti by treating one patient—a story of social justice, clashing cultures, and what it means to treat strangers as members of our family. Dr. Aaron Berkowitz had just finished his neurology training when he was sent to Haiti on his first assignment with Partners In Health. There, he meets Janel, a 23-year-old man with the largest brain tumor Berkowitz or any of his neurosurgeon colleagues at Harvard Medical School have ever seen. Determined to live up to Partners In Health’s mission statement “to bring the benefits of modern medical science to those most in need,” Berkowitz tries to save Janel’s life by bringing him back to Boston for a 12-hour surgery. In One by One by One, Berkowitz traces what he learns and grapples with as a young doctor trying to bridge the gap between one of the world’s richest countries and one of the world’s poorest to make the first big save of his medical career. As Janel and Berkowitz travel back and forth between the high-tech neurosurgical operating rooms of Harvard’s hospitals and Janel’s dirt-floored hut in rural Haiti, they face countless heart-wrenching twists and turns. Janel remains comatose for months after his surgery. It’s not clear he will recover enough to return to Haiti and be able to survive there. So he goes for a second brain surgery, a third, a fourth. Berkowitz brings the reader to the front lines of global humanitarian work as he struggles to overcome the challenges that arise when well-meaning intentions give rise to unintended consequences, when cultures and belief systems clash, and when it’s not clear what the right thing to do is, let alone the right way to do it. One by One by One is a gripping account of the triumphs, tragedies, and confusing spaces in between as an idealistic young doctor learns the hard but necessary lessons of living by the Haitian proverb tout moun se moun—every person is a person.
praise for FISCHER BLACK AND THE REVOLUTIONARY IDEA OF FINANCE "The story of Fischer Black. . . . is remarkable both because of the creativity of the man and because of the revolution he brought to Wall Street. . . . Mehrling's book is fascinating." —FINANCIAL TIMES "A fascinating history of things we take for granted in our everyday financial lives." —THE NEW YORK TIMES "Mehrling's book is essential reading for anyone interested in the development of modern finance or the life of an idiosyncratic creative genius." —PUBLISHERS WEEKLY "Fischer Black was more than a vital force in the development of finance theory. He was also a character. Perry Mehrling has captured both sides of the picture: the evolution of thinking about the pricing of risk and time, as well as the thinkers, especially this fascinating eccentric, who worked it out." —ROBERT M. SOWLO, Nobel laureate and Institute Professor of Economics, Emeritus, Massachusetts Institute of Technology "Although I worked closely with Fischer for nine years at Goldman Sachs and clearly recognized both his genius and the breadth and originality of his ideas, until I read this book, I had only the vaguest grasp of the source of his inspiration and no understanding at all of the source of his many idiosyncrasies." —BOB LITTERMAN, Partner, Kepos Capital "Perry Mehrling has done a remarkable job of tracing the intellectual and personal development of one of the most original and complex thinkers of our generation. Fischer Black deserved it: a charming and brilliant book about a charming and brilliant man." —ROBERT E. LUCAS JR., Nobel laureate and Professor of Economics, The University of Chicago
The Economists' Voice: Top Economists Take On Today's Problems featured a core collection of accessible, timely essays on the challenges facing today's global markets and financial institutions. The Economists' Voice 2.0: The Financial Crisis, Health Care Reform, and More is the next installment in this popular series, gathering together the strongest essays published in The Economist's Voice, a nonpartisan online journal, so that students and general readers can gain a deeper understanding of the financial developments shaping their world. This collection contains thirty-two essays written by academics, economists, presidential advisors, legal specialists, researchers, consultants, and policy makers. They tackle the plain economics and architecture of health care reform, its implications for society and the future of the health insurance industry, and the value of the health insurance subsidies and exchanges built into the law. They consider the effects of financial regulatory reform, the possibilities for ratings reform, and the issue of limiting bankers' pay. An objective examination of the financial crisis and bank bailouts results in two indispensable essays on investment banking regulation after Bear Stearns and the positives and negatives of the Paulson/Bernanke bailout. Contributors weigh the merits of future rescues and suggest alternative strategies for addressing the next financial crisis. A final section examines a unique array of topics: the stability of pension security bonds; the value of a carbon tax, especially in fostering economic and environmental sustainability; the counterintuitive perils of net neutrality; the unforeseen consequences of government debt; the meaning of the Google book search settlement; and the unexploited possibilities for profit in NFL overtime games.
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