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Learn about the life and stories of Horatio Alger, who popularized the "rags to riches" theme in the late nineteenth century. Explore how his books influenced the American culture and society with their messages of hard work, luck, and morality.
17 sie 2023 · It is time to stop lionizing and demonizing fraudulent American myths like that of Horatio Alger and instead celebrate real American business heroes.
Geck observes that Alger's themes have been transformed in modern America from their original meanings into a "male Cinderella" myth and are an Americanization of the traditional Jack tales. Each story has its clever hero, its "fairy godmother", and obstacles and hindrances to the hero's rise.
14 mar 2023 · Alissa Quart's book Bootstrapped reveals how Horatio Alger Jr. created the myth of the self-made man and the American dream, and how it shaped our culture and politics. She also challenges the bootstrapping fantasy and argues for anti-bootstrapping as a more realistic and humane approach.
18 sie 2023 · Yale SOM's Jeffrey Sonnenfeld debunks the myth of Horatio Alger, the 19th-century writer whose name became synonymous with self-improvement, and argues that the American Dream is still alive and well. He also criticizes Justice Clarence Thomas's association with the Horatio Alger Association of Distinguished Americans, which received undisclosed gifts from wealthy donors.
The Horatio Alger myth conveys three basic messages: (1) each of us is judged solely on her or his own merits; (2) we each have a fair opportunity to develop those merits; and (3) ultimately, merit will out.
Horatio Alger, Jr. (ur. 13 stycznia 1832 w Chelsea, obecnie Revere w stanie Massachusetts, zm. 18 lipca 1899 w Natick) – amerykański pisarz.
