Overrated/Underrated: 100 Experts Topple the Icons and Champion the Slighted!

by American Heritage

One hundred of America's favorite writers re-evaluate the overpraised and applaud the unappreciated in this fun and impossible-to-put-down collection of highly opinionated essays.

What began as one of American Heritage's most popular annual features is collected now in this beautifully illustrated, endlessly entertaining book. One hundred inspired, irreverent, illuminating pieces take a fresh look at the people, places and things we...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1579121632
• ISBN13: 9781579121631
• Release Date: June 2001
• Publisher: Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers
• Length: 256 Pages
• Weight: 0.75 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.6" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

Examining Past Glories Deserved & Otherwise!

This delightful book from American Heritage is a real treat, educating, entertaining and challenging the reader all at the same time. The book's sub-title, "100 experts topple the icons and champion the slighted," aptly summarizes the book's contents as authors, columnists, editors and what-not take on various subjects and tell us why it was given too much credit or not enough. Why, for instance, was Marilyn Monroe the most overrated Sex Symbol and Donna Reed, the most underrated. Donna Reed!?! Why is meatloaf such an overrated Traditional Dish and the lowly peanut butter and jelly sandwich underrated? Why is the most underrated Rock Band Creedence Clearwater? And who is the most overrated Rock Band? Wait for it! The Beatles! Read this book and learn why! More serious topics such as Founding Fathers, Presidents, Medical Breakthroughs and Events of the 20th Century get their comeuppenace as well in pithy, humorous and thoughtful comments from the likes of John Kenneth Galbraith, Caleb Carr, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. and Tom Wicker. Whether you read this book from cover to cover or jump in at random, you will enjoy it no end. It's a hoot!

Food for Thought

From time to time, American Heritage magazine asks a group of authors to name the person or thing that is most overrated and most underrated in each author's field of expertise. "Overrated/Underrated" assembles three years worth of answers to those questions, and the result is a quick and enjoyable read.Almost everyone has heard of the famous aviatrix Amelia Earhart, but far fewer know of Harriet Quimby, a flamboyant beauty who was the first woman to fly solo across the English Channel. When someone asks "who is the most famous sex symbol of the twentieth century?", Marilyn Monroe is a safe bet for the answer--but what about Donna Reed, named by one author as the most underrated sex symbol of her time? And what about Robert E. Lee--was he the great strategist that history makes him out to be, or was he really "the original Teflon general"?Overrated/Underrated pillories many icons and offers substitutes to replace them--as a result, it's bound to irritate readers, but that's half the fun. And since each article is fairly short, the book can easily be interrupted and put aside (thus making it ideal for airplane travel).