50: Wake Up and Live, Part 2 - Machine Men

Please note that the accompanying graphic for this episode has not been chosen lightly and is intended in the spirit of historical education, criticism and artistic commentary.

In part 2 of our investigation into the saga of Wake Up and Live, we look at the original 1936 self-help book by Dorothea Brande, the toxic ideas that the book perpetuates and the author's ties to fascism and Nazism. To understand why fascism became popular in the United States during the 1930s is also to understand why Wake Up and Live became a bestseller. This week we take a close look at both, from the infamous 1939 Nazi rally at Madison Square Garden to the publication and editing career of Brande's husband, Seward Collins, before going over the horrible, horrible book in full detail.

Selected sources for this episode:

• "Kendrick v. Drake, Beef of the century?" White People Won't Save You podcast episode, 10 May 2024.
• A Night at the Garden (2017)
• Nazi Town USA (2024) (PBS' American Experience, Season 36, Episode 1)
• Arnie Bernstein - Swastika Nation (2013)
• Joanna Scutts - "Fascist Sympathies: On Dorothea Brande", The Nation, 13 August 2013
• Albert E. Stone Jr. - "Seward Collins and the American Review Experiment in Pro-Fascism, 1933-37", American Quarterly, Vol. 12, No.1, Spring 1960
• John Roy Carlson - Under Cover (1943)
• Henry Hoke - It's a Secret (1946)
• Michael Sayers - Sabotage! The Secret War Against America (1942)
• FBI investigation on Maria Griebl, via FOIA-requested documentation
• Review of Wake Up and Live in The Saturday Review of Literature, 2 May 1936
• Hortense Finch - Classroom report on use of Wake Up and Live, from The English Journal, Vol. 27, No.2, Feb 1938

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