Dale Maharidge: How Nothing Much Has Changed in America in 35 Years

In October 1995, the American writer Dale Maharidge - the co-author with the photo-journalist Michael Williamson of the 1985 book A Journey To Nowhere: The Saga of the New Underclass - got a call out of the blue from one of Bruce Springsteen’s people. It turned out that Springsteen had been so moved by A Journey to Nowhere that he had written two songs for his new album, The Ghost of Tom Joad about it: “Youngstown” and “New Timer”.

35 years and several award-winning (including a Pulitzer) books after the publication of A Journey To Nowhere, Dale Maharidge is back with his 2020 saga of the not-so-new underclass - a travelogue of suffering entitled Fucked At Birth: Recalibrating the American Dream for the 2020s. On today's episode, Andrew has the honor of being the first person to interview Maharidge about his important new book.