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"In his new book, John F. Kasson examines the signs of crisis in American life a century ago, signs that new forces of modernity were affecting men's sense of who and what they really were.".
"When the Prussian-born Eugen Sandow, an international vaudeville star and bodybuilder, toured the United States in the 1890s, Florenz Ziegfeld cannily presented him as the "perfect man," representing both an ancient ideal of manhood and a modern commodity extolling self-development and self-fulfillment.
With Harry Houdini, the dream of escape was literally embodied in spectacular performances in which he triumphed over every kind of threat to masculine integrity - bondage, imprisonment, insanity, and death. Then, when Edgar Rice Burroughs's Tarzan swung from tree to tree and into the public eye in 1912, the fantasy of a perfect white Anglo-Saxon male was taken further, escaping the confines of civilization but reasserting its values, beating his chest and bellowing his triumph to the world. Kasson's liberally illustrated and persuasively argued study analyzes the themes linking these figures and places them in their rich historical and cultural context.
Concern with the white male body - with exhibiting it and with the perils to it - suffused American culture in the years before World War I, he suggests, and continues with us today."--BOOK JACKET.
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Previews available in: English
Subjects
Body, Human, History, Human Body, Masculinity in popular culture, Men in popular culture, Social aspects, Social aspects of the Human body, Tarzan (Fictitious character), Body image in men, Houdini, harry, 1874-1926, Human body, social aspects, Popular culture, united statesPlaces
United StatesShowing 3 featured editions. View all 3 editions?
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1
Houdini, Tarzan, and the Perfect Man: The White Male Body and the Challenge of Modernity in America
July 2, 2002, Hill and Wang
Paperback
in English
0809055473 9780809055470
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WorldCat
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2
Houdini, Tarzan, and the perfect man: the white male body and the challenge of modernity in America
2001, Hill and Wang
in English
- 1st ed.
0809088622 9780809088621
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3
Houdini, Tarzan, and the perfect man: the white male body and the challenge of modernity in America
2001, Hill and Wang
in English
0809055473 9780809055470
|
zzzz
Libraries near you:
WorldCat
|
Book Details
First Sentence
"Images of male muscular development and bodily perfection have both a distinguished lineage and a troubled history in Western culture."
The Physical Object
ID Numbers
First Sentence
"Images of male muscular development and bodily perfection have both a distinguished lineage and a troubled history in Western culture."
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- Created April 29, 2008
- 6 revisions
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August 6, 2010 | Edited by IdentifierBot | added LibraryThing ID |
April 24, 2010 | Edited by Open Library Bot | Fixed duplicate goodreads IDs. |
April 16, 2010 | Edited by bgimpertBot | Added goodreads ID. |
April 14, 2010 | Edited by Open Library Bot | Linked existing covers to the edition. |
April 29, 2008 | Created by an anonymous user | Imported from amazon.com record |