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Writer, artist, cinematographer, filmmaker, and self-described explorer Rowe applies his keen-eyed skills to chronicle 1965–1975. Each chapter covers a year in the world. This makes for a long, riveting read for the armchair historian and a useful reference volume for casual research by students and memory lane strollers. Substantial notes, a bibliography, and an index support the narrative focused upon political and military activity. But as there's no realistic way to entirely separate those topics from the era's music, art, fashion, and other cultural ramifications, there's plenty of material to satisfy readers more attuned to the arts, humanities, and popular history. Budding twenty-first-century activists and revolutionaries can study the movers and shakers who spun the world forward with demonstrations, political theatre, and outright violent revolution that propelled hard-won progress in civil, women's, student, and workers' rights movements around the globe.
A collection of brief vignettes covering the highlights of this decade might normally come across as much more episodic and encyclopedic. However, the lively writing and engaging storytelling in this work allow for the illusion of a flowing story arc. "The mélange may at times feel like a psychedelic kaleidoscope," Rowe states in the introduction, an apt metaphor for an era universally ablaze with innovation and change. A bit of the magic also stems from the fascinating subject matter. Though diverse and with a cast of thousands, it feels interconnected with the resonance and relevance of karmic action and reaction that rapidly sparked and exploded during the decade. The book begins with the year 1965 because, Rowe states, "The Sixties in the way we usually think about them, really started with the revolutionary year.... From the perspective of the late '70s, Bob Dylan observed that 'I guess the '50s ended in about '65.'"
RECOMMENDED by the US Review