Hip Figures begins and ends with the 2008 election of Barack Obama—a landmark moment in the politics of race and hipness alike. In ideological terms, however, Szalay notes that Obama shares many points of affinity with his Democratic predecessor, Bill Clinton; like Clinton, he observes, Obama embodies a brand of neoliberal hip—with the obvious additional advantage of actually being our first black president, thereby claiming the laurel Toni Morrison famously bestowed on Clinton in 1998.
Los Angeles Review of Books managing editor Evan Kindley reviews Michael Szalay’s Hip Figures: A Literary History of the Democratic Party.

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