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Matthew Weiner's series Mad Men is more than a resonant time capsule. Elisabeth Bronfen's claim is that the show not only thrives on a significant double voicing, reviving the literature, film, music and fashion of the past within and for the cultural concerns of the present. With Don Draper an embodiment of the prototypical con man, his precarious journey from poverty to fame and prosperity can also be seen as a continuation of the moral perfectionism so key to the American tradition. His fall and spiritual recovery is as much an individual story as a comment on the state of the nation. Mad Men reflects on the role television has come to play in this work of the cultural imaginary, both fragile and fruitful. We identify and sympathize with the people in this series not despite but because they are fictional representations, different yet also a mirror of ourselves.
List of contents
7 - 26 The American Dream-A Game of Confidence (Elisabeth Bronfen)27 - 74 Pitching America (Elisabeth Bronfen)75 - 100 Beyond the Happiness Principle (Elisabeth Bronfen)101 - 126 The Elevator-A Heteropia (Elisabeth Bronfen)127 - 146 National Hauntings (Elisabeth Bronfen)147 - 160 The Moon Belongs to Everyone (Elisabeth Bronfen)161 - 180 Going Commercial (Elisabeth Bronfen)
About the author
Elisabeth Bronfen, aufgewachsen in München als Tochter eines jüdisch-amerikanischen Anwalts und einer deutschen Mutter, Studium in Harvard und an der Münchner Schauspielschule, seit 1993 Lehrstuhlinhaberin am Englischen Seminar der Universität Zürich Spezialgebiet: Anglo-Amerikanische Literatur des 19. und 20. Jahrhunderts.
