Strange Days Indeed: The 1970s: The Golden Days of Paranoia

Like reviewer Stan Prager, I am close to the author's age and lived through the events he describes. These were intense experiences and, of course, I have trouble separating the Weltschmerz of the times from the angst of growing up from personal successes and failures. I can't really discuss it with older or younger people, they either weren't there or saw events in a different perspective. And I can't gain any distance by talking to people my own age. This book combines big, hard facts with subtle detail to paint a picture that feels right. Other reviewers saw an amusing hodgepodge of anecdotes and statistics that didn't lead anywhere. Some enjoyed the book, some didn't, but all missed the point (possibly due to inherent generational miscommunication). This is cultural anthropology, not travelogue. The closest comparison I can make is to Charles McKay's Extraordinary Popular Delusions and The Madness of Crowds. The 1970s had a searing impact on people born in the 1950s, and were as important for the transition from that decade to modern times as the 1960s. The swinging 60's had a cheerful optimism that makes them popular today, the 70's had a pessimistic paranoia that people like to forget or parody. Those are mistakes. For all its craziness, it faced up to reality like a wartime generation, and its bedrock principles support our culture. What World War I did to aristocrats and the 30s did to bankers, the 70s did to their democratically-elected, university-degreed successors. We still have popular political leaders and respected experts, but until every person in my generation dies, they can never have the unquestioned power that fed the horrors of the mid-20th century. We may make worse mistakes, but we won't make that one. I recommend this to 50-somethings as a way to achieve closure with your formative late teenage / early 20's years. Every page will illuminate a memory, and things will fit together in a rational way that was impossible to see at the time or at the age. For everyone else, read it for some amusing stories and interesting bits of history, but also to see the strong 70s strands that continue to bind us.

Francis Wheen is to be commended for an immensely enjoyable, entertaining, and informative work. Focusing mostly on the US and UK in the 70s, Wheen highlights the raging paranoia that infected both the highest levels of government and the common man, but does so in a humorous way. As a student of the decade I found that he captured the feeling and aura of living through that time -- the bizarre twists and turns of economic and social upheaval and societies around the globe just waiting for revolution that they were so certain was right around the corner. You can't time travel back to the Seventies, but you'll definitely feel like you visited there (then?) after reading this book. Masterfully done with a superb narrative voice, highest possible recommendation.

Before I begin let me just warn you. This is not a traditional history book. Strange Days Indeed is analytical book that takes a look at the various people in the 1970s that author Francis Wheen has deemed relevant. The end product is funny, yet very informative at the same time. I wanted to read this book for one real reason. I wanted to see the author's take on Nixon's paranoia since many consider that to be his major downfall. Strange Days Indeed does not disappoint and the Nixon chapters are really quite interesting. That's far from the whole thing though. Harold Wilson and Mao Zedong are also featured heavily in this book. Wheen ties them all together and I believe he created a bit of paranoia on his own. The 1970s were a strange time, indeed. This is a great book which takes the reader down that road again. It's kind of interesting to see the comparisons between the 70s and the present day. Maybe that's not what Wheen intended. A great book that any fan of historical satire should get a kick out of.

This book starts by saying that people who lived the 60's would tell the next generation (the 70's) that they were born too late. After reading this book I would say I was born just in time (80's). As I was born 1980, I really don't remember much of the 80's but I am sure glad to have lived as a young adult through the 90's. But enough about me. I knew very little about the seventies. I knew the style, the cars, and just about everything was rather campy. Now I know that it was one of the western worlds most turbulent decades, I am truly glad I didn't live through it. If you love history than this book is a fascinating ride through all the crazy happenings of the time and the very crazy players. As I knew very little of the decade before this book I can not point out any inaccuracies. Altough I must point out that I now know who Haldeman is. For any younger audience members of the show 30 Rock they will also be glad to know (unless they already did). However they will not find the definition of Murkins or the alternative meanings to BFF in here. They will simply have to google those things.