"An extraordinarily ambitious effort of synthesis, worthy of comparison with the synthesis attempted a decade ago by Fredric Jameson's The Political Unconscious. This book speaks in a fresh voice, a voice that clearly knows all of the most interesting thinking on the politics of culture over the past few years yet is stimulated rather than burdened by its knowledge. It will be welcomed with exhilaration by the large and ever-increasing audience for the theory and practice of cultural studies as well as, I'm convinced, by an unusually broad general readership. No one thinking about the complex relations between aesthetics and politics will be able to ignore it."--Bruce Robbins, editor of Intellectuals: Aesthetics, Politics, Academics