The Unwinding: An Inner History of the New America (69 page)

For expert help of different kinds, I thank Nancy Aaron, Kathleen Anderson, Neil Belton,
Julia Botero, Lila Byock, Peter Canby, Ray Chipault, Rodrigo Corral, Tom Ehrlich,
Jiayang Fan, Tim Farrell, Amy Hanauer, Stephen Heintz, Henry Kaufman, Alissa Levin,
Jonathan Lippincott, Rebecca Mead, Ellie Perkins, Chris Peterson, Chris Richards,
Nandi Rodrigo, Ridge Schuyler, Jeff Seroy, Michael Spies, Scott Staton, Julie Tate,
Matthew Taylor, Sarita Varma, Jacob Weisberg, Dorothy Wickenden, Laura Young, and
Avi Zenilman. I am especially grateful to Sarah Chalfant, Jonathan Galassi, David
Remnick, Alex Star, and Daniel Zalewski—there are none better.

I can never repay my debt to those friends and family members whose insight and enthusiasm
sustained me through the years of work—Daniel Bergner, Tom Casciato, Bill Finnegan,
Kathy Hughes, Carol Jack, Michael Janeway, Ann Packer, Nancy Packer, Eyal Press, Becky
Saletan, Bob Secor, Marie Secor, and especially Dexter Filkins; and most of all to
Laura Secor, who makes everything possible.

ALSO BY GEORGE PACKER

NONFICTION

The Village of Waiting

Blood of the Liberals

The Assassins’ Gate: America in Iraq

Interesting Times: Writings from a Turbulent Decade

FICTION

The Half Man

Central Square

PLAYS

Betrayed

AS EDITOR

The Fight Is for Democracy: Winning the War of Ideas in America and the World

Facing Unpleasant Facts: Narrative Essays
by George Orwell

All Art Is Propaganda: Critical Essays
by George Orwell

A NOTE ABOUT THE AUTHOR

George Packer is a staff writer for
The New Yorker
and the author of
The Assassins’ Gate: America in Iraq
, which received several prizes and was named one of the ten best books of 2005 by
The New York Times Book Review
. He is also the author of two novels,
The Half Man
and
Central Square
, and two other works of nonfiction,
Blood of the Liberals
, which won the 2001 Robert F. Kennedy Book Award, and
The Village of Waiting
. His play,
Betrayed
, ran off-Broadway for five months in 2008 and won the Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding
Play. His most recent book is
Interesting Times: Writings from a Turbulent Decade
. He lives in Brooklyn.

Farrar, Straus and Giroux

18 West 18th Street, New York 10011

Copyright © 2013 by George Packer

All rights reserved

First edition, 2013

Portions of this work originally appeared, in different form, in
The New Yorker.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Packer, George, 1960–

   The unwinding: an inner history of the new America / George Packer. — First edition.

        pages   cm

   ISBN 978-0-374-10241-8 (hardcover)

   1.  United States—History—1969–   2.  United States—Social conditions—1980–   3.  United
States—Biography.   4.  Social problems—United States.   5.  Crises—United States.  
6.  United States—Politics and government—1989–   7.  Politicians—United States—Biography.  
8.  Celebrities—United States—Biography.   I.  Title.

E839 .P28 2013

973.924—dc23

2013004431

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eISBN 9781466836952