Russell Jacoby is a professor of history and education at UCLA and the author of several books of history, politics, and cultural criticism, including The End of Utopia: Politics and Culture in the Age of Apathy, Dogmatic Wisdom: How the Culture Wars Divert Education and Distract America, and The Last Intellectuals: American Culture in the Age of Academe. He also reviews books for The Nation, the Los Angeles Times Book Review, and other publications.
A brilliant analysis of iconoclastic utopian speculation, especially important at a time when even the proponents of universal health care are decried as obtrusive fanatics. -- Amos Elon, author, The Pity of It All: A Portrait of the German-Jewish Epoch, 1743-1933 In four beautifully crafted, highly allusive essays, Jacoby excavates a plethora of utopian movements...with the aim of getting readers to dream of a better world. -- Publishers Weekly Like all of Russell Jacoby's books, Picture Imperfect is a timely, passionate, bravely unfashionable intervention... this is a book to be treasured. -- Nation In Picture Imperfect: Utopian Thought for an Anti-Utopian Age Jacoby... asks the big, subversive questions. -- Michael Hirsch, Dissident Voice Jacoby offers a provocative, concise, and well-researched book-length essay about traditional utopian thinking... Recommended. -- Choice By attuning our ears to the distant murmur, Russell Jacoby has performed an invaluable service in Picture Imperfect. -- Douglas W. Texter, H-Net Reviews