Future: A Recent History.

Future: A Recent History

Lawrence R. Samuel

University of Texas Press

PO Box 7819, Austin, TX 78713-7819

9780292719149 $45.00 www.utexaspress.com 1-800-252-3206

Future: A Recent History is a social history that examines how intellectuals, artists, scientists, businesspeople, and others perceived the impending future, all during the past century. Classifying six different eras of "future narratives" and pervasive tropes permeating in public consciousness, Future: A Recent History reveals as much about ourselves as it does about our predictions past of what the future would bring. Human society's discoveries in everything from space travel to atomic and nuclear weapons to the women's and civil rights movement served to shape not only the actual future, but the visions people had of the future. An amazing and insightful collection, recommended to anyone curious about the future or (more importantly) about those individuals curious enough to dream of something and risk life and limb to fin it.