アメリカ人の俗物根性を仔細に大解剖 [単行本]

そもそも人はスノッブ(俗物)に生まれるのか、それとも、成り上がる過程でスノッブになるのか?他人よりちょっと上だと思いたい意識と、伝統・文化が欠落している風土が相まって、アメリカで見事に花開いた俗物精神。しかし、ワスプの栄華が過ぎ去ったいま、アメリカでは別の種類の俗物主義が蔓延している。他人と差をつけるための食べ物、ワイン、車、居住地区、ファッション、大学、政治―流行の最先端を走りたがり、有名人好きで、子供自慢がやめられないアメリカ人たちの実像を活写。ユーモアと鋭い洞察、うんちくと自身の自慢話を織りまぜた見事な描写が、読者の爆笑を誘う。このテーマをこれほど広範に掘り下げた本は、ウィリアム・サッカレーによる「The Book of Snobs」(1848)以来。本書はアメリカ人の苦笑と賞賛を浴びながら、ニューヨークタイムズ・ベストセラー・ランキングを一気に駆け上がった奇書である。

なぜか、笑っちゃう。ジャガーに乗る人は俗物主義者! 自由の国を謳いながら、服装、食事、職業、大学、持ち物、趣味などで周囲と差をつけ、優越感を得ようとする米国人のスノッブぶりを、あらゆる角度から具体的に解説。

Noted essayist and former American Scholar editor Epstein, having enlightened us on ambition (Ambition: The Secret Passion), now turns to its companion, snobbery. The topic is ripe with promise, but Epstein's observations are less revelatory than entertaining. Underneath their pretentious exteriors, he writes, snobs are insecure people who have latched onto arbitrary measures of status to prove they're worthier than those around them. It's natural fallout, he says, in a world where complete fairness is nonexistent. The best antidote to snobbery, Epstein suggests, is to treat people the same, regardless of their circumstances, and to value things for their intrinsic worth rather than their cachet. Epstein shares his own snobbish tendencies and biases at the outset. From childhood, he writes, his snob radar was fully operational, and by his senior year in high school he was already "an impressively cunning statustician." Epstein goes on to deal with a range of past and present pretensions relating to class, work, democracy, possessions, parenting, college, clubs and intellectualism. In one delicious instance, he describes an American reaction to visiting royalty. "Princess Diana, not long before she died, visited Northwestern University, where I teach," he writes. "The spectacle of the university president, a smallish man in glasses, following the Princess about the campus, yapping away, reminded one of nothing so much as that of a Chihuahua attempting to mount an Afghan hound." The chapter on name-dropping is particularly sharp, citing a variety of ways people exploit connections to well-known individuals for social profit. Epstein has a wickedly wonderful sense of humor and keen observational skills, both on display in the firsthand anecdotes scattered throughout this essayistic assemblage.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --このテキストは、絶版本またはこのタイトルには設定されていない版型に関連付けられています。

A national bestseller, Snobbery examines the discriminating qualities in all of us. With dishy detail, Joseph Epstein skewers all manner of elitism in contemporary America. He offers his arch observations of the new footholds of snobbery: food, fashion, high-achieving children, schools, politics, being with-it, name-dropping, and much more. Clever, incisive, and immensely entertaining, Snobberyexplores the shallows and depths of status and taste -- with enviable results.
--このテキストは、 ペーパーバック 版に関連付けられています。

Joseph Epstein was born and educated in Chicago, where, since 1974, he has been a lecturer in English and writing at Northwestern University. From 1975 to 1997 he was the editor of The American Scholar. Three of the essays in this volume were chosen for The Anchor Essay Annual and The Best American Essays, where his work has frequently appeared. "The modern essay," as Karl Shapiro has written, "has regained a good deal of its literary status in our time, much to the credit of Joseph Epstein."
--このテキストは、絶版本またはこのタイトルには設定されていない版型に関連付けられています。

エプスタイン,ジョゼフ
シカゴで生まれ、同地で教育を受ける。1974年よりノースウェスタン大学で英語と文章技術を教えている。その間、1975年から97年までは「アメリカン・スカラー」誌の編集者を務めた。さらに「ニューヨーカー」「アトランティック・マンスリー」「ハーパーズ・マガジン」「コメンタリー」などに多数寄稿している

広岡 結子
1956年石川県生まれ。東京女子大学文理学部英米文学科卒業。富山県在住(本データはこの書籍が刊行された当時に掲載されていたものです)