{"product_id":"what-evil-means-to-us-c-fred-alford-9780801434303","title":"What Evil Means to Us: U.S. Intelligence and Foreign Military Innovation, 1918-1941","description":"\u003cp\u003eC. Fred Alford interviewed working people, prisoners, and college students in order to discover how people experience evil--in themselves, in others, and in the world. What people meant by evil, he found, was a profound, inchoate feeling of dread so overwhelming that they tried to inflict it on others to be rid of it themselves. A leather-jacketed emergency medical technician, for example, one of the many young people for whom vampires are oddly seductive icons of evil, said he would \"give anything to be a vampire.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eDrawing on psychoanalytic theory, Alford argues that the primary experience of evil is not moral but existential. The problems of evil are complicated by the terror it evokes, a threat to the self so profound it tends to be isolated deep in the mind. Alford suggests an alternative to this bleak vision. The exercise of imagination--in particular, imagination that takes the form of a shared narrative--offers an active and practical alternative to the contemporary experience of evil. Our society suffers from a paucity of shared narratives and the creative imagination they inspire.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e C. Fred Alford\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 0801434300\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780801434303\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Cornell University Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 09\/04\/1997\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 200\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 0.88lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 9.26h x 6.38w x 0.71d\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eReview Citation(s): \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eLibrary Journal\u003c\/i\u003e 10\/01\/1997 pg. 87","brand":"C. Fred Alford","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover","offer_id":43926114369791,"sku":"9780801434303","price":51.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/products\/img_2c27e3f3-5f7d-4932-8e87-f7cd664348d2.jpg?v=1681081281","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/what-evil-means-to-us-c-fred-alford-9780801434303","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}