あらすじ
One can not understand the Sixties without understanding the Fifties. The Fifties were the first time the American youth had excess freedom. Before the 50’s they worked on the family farm; dusk till dawn, slaved in the sweat shops, 12 ours a day, six days a week; starved in the depression; and fought not knowing it they would be alive the next day in World War II and the Korean War. Than, suddenly, came the fifties. First there were the beatniks lead by their spiritual leader Williams Burrough, than the “bad boys of rock and roll Elvis, Johnny Cochran, and Jerry Lee Lewis prevailed. This excess freedom, led to freedom to think, freedom to question, freedom to challenge. Throughout the book we follow the characters lives from romantic innocence to reality to Expressionism. Some fighting in Vietnam, some protesting the war, some marching for civil rights, friendships destroyed and than repaired. Some lives lost, some destroyed, some survived, but all caught up in the hubris characterized by a gross failure of governmental leadership. Those betrayed the most have their names on a black granite wall in Washington DC.
