In the American jungle [1925-1936]

A keen-eyed chronicler turns his library into a window on an America that feels both familiar and wildly foreign. In a series of short, vivid essays he maps the turbulence from the exuberant boom of the 1920s through the stark shadows of the Depression, using the metaphor of a jungle to describe the tangled mix of imported European ideas and home‑grown myth. The voice is both personal and scholarly, recalling the cramped, book‑filled rooms where the world seemed to contract to the turn of a page, while the city outside pulses with strangers and secrets.

The collection is arranged in four parts—snapshots of a booming year, portraits of cultural icons, reflections on the peculiar traits of the United States, and a set of practical conclusions for the survival of its people. Readers encounter lively sketches of figures such as Freud and Chaplin, sharp commentary on cinema, jazz, and commerce, and a restless search for meaning amid machines and metaphysics. The result is a restless, lyrical portrait of a nation on the brink of a new, uncertain era.