Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)I'll admit to not having high expectations for this book; after all, it is only 128 pages long. Unfortunately, it was really disappointing. There just simply is not enough insightful information here to make it really interesting.
The goal of the book is to look at some of the more ridiculous predictions of the future made throughout history, from giant "land submarines" to jetpacks. But there are two big problems with how the authors treat this subject. The first is that their approach is very superficial--they touch on each subject quickly and then abandon it, rather than grouping them together in weightier themes. It's like eating finger foods, each bite is unsatisfying. Some of these subjects, like mega-cities or massive vehicles, also deserve a deeper discussion. Instead, the authors assert that (paraphrasing) "things are gigantic when times are good" and mention the dinosaurs and large prehistoric insects. That's a rather odd and imprecise statement to make, and although it might apply to biological entities, it doesn't necessarily apply to manmade objects. What about computers? Why are they getting smaller? And are big things naturally "good"?
The other major problem is a startling lack of dates. Photographs, magazine illustrations and diagrams are frequently presented without _any_ indication of when they were made. Is this illustration from the 1950s or the Depression-era 1930s? Isn't that relevant to why it might have been produced? Many of the pulp magazine covers are cropped in such a way that the dates are cut off, which is incredibly annoying. Thus, the book reads like a haphazzardly arranged scrapbook, without any keen insights about how or why people might make erroneous predictions about the future.
Click Here to see more reviews about: Follies of Science: 20th Century Visions of Our Fantastic Future
Promises for the future were made; some sadly broken and some unfortunately honored. While we didn't get household jetpacks and personal serving-drinks-by-the-pool robots, or even our orgasmatrons, we did get things like the super-fantastic building materials of the future—asbestos, lead, and foam.
So just what was the utopian master plan for future households during the early twentieth century? Follies of Science is the keeper of such knowledge, offering glimpses into sparkling, smooth lead paint covering our living room walls, dazzling DDT foggers killing mosquitoes dead, alchemists transforming atoms into gold and diamonds, homeowners living in "The Foam House of the Future," and, of course, commuters blasting away on their jet packs to work. Utopian indeed.
Aptly illustrated with full-color and black-and-white classic imagery, the visions of the future spread across page after page, pulling the reader in to what could have been and what shouldn't have been.
Eric Dregni has written nine books, including Midwest Marvels, The Scooter Bible, Ads that Put America on Wheels, and Grazie a Dio non sono bolognese. As a 2004 Fulbright Fellow to the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim, Dregni researched Scandinavian culture and roots for a forthcoming book. His time is divided between Italy, Norway, and Minneapolis where he is the curator for El Dorado Conquistador Museum and guitarist for the mock-rock trio Vinnie & the Stardüsters.
Jonathan Dregni is a futurist and sci-fi enthusiast, raising a family midway between the soon-to-be domed cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul Minnesota.
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