The Quiet Before

Books

An "elegantly argued and exuberantly narrated" (The New York Times Book Review) look at the building of social movements--from the 1600s to the present--and how current technology is undermining them "A bravura work of scholarship and reporting, featuring amazing individuals and dramatic events from seventeenth-century France to Rome, Moscow, Cairo, and contemporary Minneapolis."--Louis Menand, author of The Free World We tend to think of revolutions as loud: frustrations and demands shouted in the streets. But the ideas fueling them have traditionally been conceived in much quieter spaces, in the small, secluded corners where a vanguard can whisper among themselves, imagine alternate realities, and deliberate about how to achieve their goals. This extraordinary book is a search for those spaces, over centuries and across continents, and a warning that--in a world dominated by social media--they might soon go extinct. Gal Beckerman, an editor at The New York Times Book Review, takes us back to the ...