The Empire's Old Clothes: What the Lone Ranger, Babar, and Other Innocent Heroes Do to Our Minds

New York: Pantheon Books. Very Good+. (c.1983). First Edition. Softcover. 0394714865 . [short diagonal crease at top right-hand corner of front cover, otherwise just light handling wear; text is clean, binding solid]. Trade PB The author "explores the hidden political and social messages behind the smiling faces" that populate comic books and other forms of popular literature, and in doing so "provides a stunning map to the secret world inside the most successful cultural symbols of our time." This is "a book that will appeal to those who want to understand the connection between politics and culture, between Ronald Reagan and Mickey Mouse, between economic theories of development and children's literature. It is for those who are fascinated by the mass media, for parents and teachers who are worried about what their children are watching and reading, for anyone who wants to understand the way ideas are produced and manipulated in the twentieth century." (You remember the twentieth century. It was fun, wasn't it?) .