Cars are the scourge of civilization, responsible for everything
from suburban sprawl and urban decay to environmental devastation
and rampant climate change--not to mention our slavish dependence
on foreign oil from dubious sources abroad. Add the astonishing
price in human lives that we pay for our automobility--some thirty
million people were killed in car accidents during the twentieth
century--plus the countless number of hours we waste in gridlock
traffic commuting to work, running errands, picking up our kids,
and searching for parking, and one can't help but ask: Haven't we
had enough already? After a century behind the wheel, could we be
reaching the end of the automotive age? From the Model T to the
SUV, "Autophobia" reveals that our vexed relationship with the
automobile is nothing new--in fact, debates over whether cars are
forces of good or evil in our world have raged for over a century
now, ever since the automobile was invented. According to Brian
Ladd, this love and hate relationship we share with our cars is the
defining quality of the automotive age. And "everyone" has an
opinion about them, from the industry shills, oil barons, and
radical libertarians who offer cars blithe paeans and deny their
ill effects, to the technophobes, treehuggers, and killjoys who
curse cars, ignoring the very real freedoms and benefits they
provide us. Focusing in particular on our world's cities, and
spanning settings as varied as belle epoque Paris, Nazi Germany,
postwar London, Los Angeles, New York, and the smoggy Shanghai of
today, Ladd explores this love and hate relationship throughout,
acknowledging adherents and detractors of the automobile alike.
Eisenhower, Hitler, Jan and Dean, J. G. Ballard, Ralph Nader, OPEC,
and, of course, cars, all come into play in this wide-ranging but
remarkably wry and pithy book. A dazzling display of erudition,
"Autophobia" is cultural commentary at its most compelling, history
at its most searching--and a surprising page-turner.
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