On Freedom

Four Songs of Care and Constraint

Author  Maggie Nelson
On Freedom

A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK
A GUARDIAN AND TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT 'BOOK OF THE YEAR' PICK
A WASHINGTON POST NOTABLE WORK OF NONFICTION

So often deployed as a jingoistic, even menacing rallying cry, or limited by a focus on passing moments of liberation, the rhetoric of freedom both rouses and repels. Does it remain key to our autonomy, justice, and well-being, or is freedom's long star turn coming to a close? Does a continued obsession with the term enliven and emancipate, or reflect a deepening nihilism (or both)? On Freedom examines such questions by tracing the concept's complexities in four distinct realms: art, sex, drugs, and climate.

Drawing on a vast range of material, from critical theory to pop culture to the…