The Hippies

February 15, 2017
From the civil rights movement to the Vietnam War, the New Frontier to the Great Society, the 1960s was a decade like no other. At its vanguard were the hippies, idealistic seekers of alternative ways, the direct descendants of the Beat generation's hipsters. Imbibers of LSD and marijuana, proponents of free speech and free love, critics of the politicians who ruled them and the parents who raised them, hippies were a countercultural youth subculture whose message of peace, love, and understanding sounded idyllic but was, in reality, hard to sustain. Through the infamous Summer of Love to the incendiary 1968 Democratic Convention, from the muddy mayhem of Woodstock to the murderous rampage at Altamont, the growth of the hippie movement shocked the status quo and left a legacy still felt in music, arts, politics, and personal growth. In this exemplary treatise on the vast reaches and deep roots of a defining movement, Moretta offers a probing and potent work of cultural anthropology that captures the essence of the youthful energy that changed a nation and influenced the world.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)