"The American Dream" is one of the most familiar and resonant phrases in our national lexicon. In this short, fluid narrative, James Cullen explores how the concept has been defined and sought after throughout American history, through dreams of religious freedom, property ownership, upward mobility, social equality, and personal fulfillment. "Jim Cullen's The American Dream is a tour de force through the whole of American history, from the Puritans to home ownership and California. Cullen daringly takes the notion of the American Dream as a touchstone for a huge swathe of American cultural history, and tracks its complexities, its shifts and conflicts--and unities. Gracefully written, elegantly unified, respectful toward disparate ideas, never indulgent of scholastic gobbledygook, the book has all the strength of its simplifications. A marvelous achievement." --Todd Gitlin, Columbia University