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The Death of Truth: Notes on Falsehood in the Age of Trump Audiobook
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NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From the Pulitzer Prize–winning critic comes an impassioned critique of America’s retreat from reason We live in a time when the very idea of objective truth is mocked and discounted by the occupants of the White House. Discredited conspiracy theories and ideologies have resurfaced, proven science is once more up for debate, and Russian propaganda floods our screens. The wisdom of the crowd has usurped research and expertise, and we are each left clinging to the beliefs that best confirm our biases. How did truth become an endangered species in contemporary America? This decline began decades ago, and in The Death of Truth, former New York Times critic Michiko Kakutani takes a penetrating look at the cultural forces that contributed to this gathering storm. In social media and literature, television, academia, and politics, Kakutani identifies the trends—originating on both the right and the left—that have combined to elevate subjectivity over factuality, science, and common values. And she returns us to the words of the great critics of authoritarianism, writers like George Orwell and Hannah Arendt, whose work is newly and eerily relevant. With remarkable erudition and insight, Kakutani offers a provocative diagnosis of our current condition and points toward a new path for our truth-challenged times.
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“Versatile narrator Tavia Gilbert performs this significant audiobook with a sure sense of its importance. Her focused reading suits the intent of its thought-provoking treatise…The literary allusions and philosophical insights packed into the work would create a challenge for any narrator. Gilbert meets that challenge admirably.”
— AudioFile
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“A compact yet expansive treatise on political disinformation…[that] dazzles most when Kakutani gleans lessons from literature to comprehend our times.”
— O, The Oprah Magazine -
"[Kakutani] considers our troubling era of alternative facts and traces the trends that have brought us to this horrific moment where the very concept of ‘objective reality’ provokes a certain nostalgia.”
— Millions -
“Pulitzer-winning Kakutani…thoroughly understands the impact of language and the necessity of communication in good faith. So it’s no wonder that concern over the lies and destructiveness of the Trump presidency inspired this galvanizing social critique…Elegantly well-argued and profoundly illuminating.”
— Booklist (starred review) -
“She sees—and ably describes—with a depressing clarity the dangers of our brave new world….and, ultimately, the dire threat all of this poses for the democracy we profess to cherish.”
— Kirkus Reviews -
"[Kakutani is here] Investigating fake news, relativism, and the assumption that all opinions are equally valid to show that today the concept of truth is being demeaned. Ranging from pop culture to deconstructionists to Bill Clinton and Donald Trump.”
— Library Journal -
“Honest, factual debate is expiring…Kakutani blames not just the populist right but the postmodern, literary theory of the academic left—formerly subversive critical stances that, she argues, have bequeathed a nihilistic rejection of reason and Enlightenment values.”
— Publishers Weekly
Awards
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A Booklist Pick of This Week's Best Books
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A Millions.com Pick
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A New York Times bestseller
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A New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice of the Week
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An O Magazine Pick of the Month
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An Esquire Magazine Pick of Best Books of 2018 (So Far)
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About Michiko Kakutani
Michiko Kakutani is a Pulitzer Prize-winning literary critic and the former chief book critic of the New York Times.
About Tavia Gilbert
Tavia Gilbert is an acclaimed narrator of more than four hundred full-cast and multivoice audiobooks for virtually every publisher in the industry. Named the 2018 Voice of Choice by Booklist magazine, she is also winner of the prestigious Audie Award for best narration. She has earned numerous Earphones Awards, a Voice Arts Award, and a Listen-Up Award. Audible.com has named her a Genre-Defining Narrator: Master of Memoir. In addition to voice acting, she is an accomplished producer, singer, and theater actor. She is also a producer, singer, photographer, and a writer, as well as the cofounder of a feminist publishing company, Animal Mineral.