Not With a Bang But a Whimper: The Politics and Culture of Decline

Theodore Dalrymple's brilliant new collection of writings follows on the extraordinary success of his earlier books, Life at the Bottom and Our Culture, What's Left of It. No writer today is more adept and incisive in exploring the state of our culture and the ideas that are changing our ways of life. In Not with a Bang But a Whimper, he takes the measure of our cultural decline, with special attention to Britain-its bureaucratic muddle, oppressive welfare mentality, and aimless young-all pursued in the name of democracy and freedom. He shows how terrorism and the growing numbers of Muslim minorities have changed our public life. Also here are Mr. Dalrymple's trenchant observations on artists and ideologues, and on the treatment of criminals and the mentally disturbed, his area of medical interest.