Old Money

The book was just what I expected. I had done some prior research on the topic, and the book confirmed my research efforts.

Over the course of a few too many years I have acquired a 3-foot stack of classic books on wealth, status and power in America, and this is both the latest addition and the undisputed spiritual (!) capstone of the collection. "Rich and nuanced" is how I would characterize Mr. Aldrich's comprehensive assessment of the phenomenon of inherited wealth and established social class in the land of the American Dream. Mythic stuff indeed (it was this word that compelled me to buy the book) -- and Aldrich's background and skills are more than up to the challenge of rendering it, in all its paradox, consternation and complexity, for the genuinely interested reader. The brief panning reviews below mystified me as well as they did the other reviewer. Aldrich starts out not with anything construable as a "justification", but rather with a withering indictment of the source of his family's wealth -- in itself a mini-education in the dynamics of 19th century pork barrel politics. Aldrich's book is both a sort of personal exorcism of family demons that others would just as soon whitewash and preen themselves over, and a subtle and multi-dimensional account of a great many interrelated issues surrounding the institution of inherited wealth and privilege, and its effect on those both inside and outside the golden pale. "Reasoned" and "balanced" are two other adjectives that suggest themselves with regard to the book's overall project. Outsiders may resent his occasional displays of sympathy for his motley compatriots in hyper-enfranchisement, but you'll have to search elsewhere (e.g. the better-written WASP Supremacy diatribes) for the "our shortcomings are colorful foibles, theirs are hideous crimes" pathology that afflicts the smug somnambulists of the Far Right. True, Aldrich hasn't climaxed his public catharsis by giving away his patrimony (though I'd be surprised if he hasn't been more than usually financially generous in all the right directions); but anyone accusing him of a lack of noblesse oblige is just being perverse or uncomprehending regarding the general thrust and intention of this eminently worthwhile read. In the author's defense, I can only suggest that the one virtually unassailable self-justification for Establishment predations -- "If it weren't us on top, it would inevitably be others, and probably the more harsh for lack of experience" -- is rendered just a bit less disconcerting by the occasional production of a gentleman as truly humane, culturally enriching, and deeply entertaining as Mr. Aldrich. As for the alleged elitist style: I too lack basic French, and tend to resent its use in expository prose. But "blipping over" a phrase here and there doesn't usually harm the overall sense of a well-heeled writer's material; and a modicum of humility obliges any reader to make an effort to step outside himself and honor the sensibilities of the more accomplished. In this and other matters of vocabulary, would the disgruntled re

Don't know what these other readers' problem is - hopefully not the envy and resentment that the author acknowledges as a natural byproduct of privilege! Aldrich is thoughtful, erudite and honest. Is he justifying himself? To a point, of course. Have you ever read a book that doesn't in some way promote the author and his values? He succeeds in a difficult endeavor, namely to describe a culture and a mentality; this he does with sympathy to its ideals and deep skepticism about its true motives and record. Also, though there may be a few too many of his own family anecdotes, it is an entertaining and informative read.

Virtually all other books describing America's moneyed class have been written by social scientists, primarily sociologists and economists, or romantic novelists, who do not have a clue as to how these people really live. Aldrich, on the other hand, comes from one of America's old moneyed families (his grandfather was a prominent U.S. Senator at the turn of the century and his uncle was Nelson Rockefeller). Educated at St. Paul's and Harvard in the fifties, he was provided with all of the benefits that money can provide. Unlike the modern ultra-rich, however, he was also provided a conscience and a sense of duty to his community. This book is, in large part, his effort to justify his own existence and that of his fellows to a society that often views them as little more than leeches who had the good fortune to be born into great wealth. In my opinion, and I suspect his as well, he ultimately fails, but he does provide the best defense of inherited wealth that I have! read. In the course of that defense, he provides great insight into how Old Money thinks -- F. Scott Fitzgerald was right; they really are different from the rest of us. Those who enjoy this book should buy a copy of Money and Class in America: Notes and Observations on Our Civil Religion by Lewis Lapham, editor of Harper's magazine and himself from Old Money.