The New Deal didn't work. Why are we repeating it? Here is a 270 word book review I wrote on Amity Shlaes' provocative recent work on the Great Depression, The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression ( Harper Perennial 2008) . I understand that Paul Krugman of the New York Times has got his knickers in a knot about this book, which suggests it might have even more to recommend it than I originally thought. ... . . The Forgotten Man by Amity Shlaes This is an unexpectedly refreshing account of the Great Depression in the USA. Although this time is still just within living memory for some, this is a most topical refresher on this destructive and instructive era. It is not so much a history, as an interconnecting narrative of personal misadventures and muddles of both the great and the good. Its title is not a reference to any particular person, as you can be forgiven for assuming. It is rather a reference to the recurring theme of “the forgotten man” from the time....
Stirring grist, grizzle and gore to flavour the stew.