In his wide-ranging books and essays, Mr. Lasch offered a leftist analysis of industrial capitalism and its effects on American politics, social arrangements, modes of thought and personal psychology. As a counterpoise to the alienation and despair he saw as pervasive in American life, he proposed a progressive program that, paradoxically, relied heavily on the values of community, family and self-discipline. Diagnosing a Malaise
"The Culture of Narcissism"(W. W. Norton) is his best-known work. In the 1979 book, which was on the New York Times best-seller list for seven weeks, he described postwar America as a society of dangerously self-absorbed individuals, fixated on personal goals, fearful of their impulses and easily controlled by power elites.
President Jimmy Carter asked Mr. Lasch to advise him on Mr. Carter's speech, delivered in July 1979, on the nation's "crisis of confidence." It became known as the "national malaise" speech. (Obituary, The New York Times, www.nytimes.com/1994/02/15/obituaries/christopher-lasch-is-dead-at-61-wrote-about-america-s-malaise.html).
See also: "The Writings of Christopher Lasch: A Bibliography-in-Progress", Compiled by Robert Cummings Social Science Division, Truman State University, Kirksville, MO 63501 rbscp.lib.rochester.edu/3271
See also: www.domusweb.it/en/opinion/2020/03/31/from-beauty-to-beauticians.html (Forty years ago, the historian and sociologist Christopher Lasch “foresaw the dramatic …
