DOC Hard Times: An Oral History of the Great Depression by Studs Terkel in History

Review

0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. "Hard Times" a let-down...By pyramidcvvStud Terkel's "Hard Times" is a collection of interviews of people who lived during the Great Depression; or were in some way related to people who did.I bought the book expecting to hear stories of people who suffered great deprivation and want during the Depression.But there's actually not that many hard luck stories here.In fact; lots of the people interviewed for this book were quite successful or otherwise got along fairly well during the Depression."Hard Times" reads more like a history of the '30s rather than a riveting account of suffering people. Terkel spends a lot of time talking about the labor movement; for example; hardly a subject unique to any decade. He also talks to people who are just criticizing Roosevelt and the New Deal (ten million remained unemployed all throughout the New Deal until the war; the suicide rate peaked in 1937-38; during Roosevelt's New Deal; not during the Hoover years).I recently read "Tombstone;" Yang Jisheng; a hair-raising; eye-witness account of the Chinese famine of 1958-1962. In this page-turner; we read about people reduced to cannibalism in which parents told their starving children to eat their bodies after they are dead.But the people who had it tough in the 1930s don't sound any different from the hard-luck stories you hear in the 21st century. You don't feel as if the Great Depression was any worse than any of the recent recessions (e.g; 1981-1982; 2008-2009).For a really gut-wrenching account of the American Depression; I think Steinbeck's "The Grapes Of Wrath" is far more hard-hitting than "Hard Times".Studs Terkel is from Chicago; so most of the interviewees come from there.Informative and entertaining; but nothing really heart-rending.0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. Five StarsBy AxlerodStuds Terkel book about the Hard Times is a classic and well worth reading!0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. Not badBy AntHad to buy for class; wasn't a bad book though.