Stammering Century Author:Gilbert Seldes 1928. The book is a study of the minor movements, cults and manias of the nineteenth century. Its personages are fanatics, radicals and mountebanks. Its intention is to connect these secondary movements and figures with the primary forces of the century and to supply a background in American history for the cults and manias of our own time: the ... more »Prohibitionists and Pentecostalists; the diet-faddists; dealers in mail order Personality; the play censors and fundamentalists; Point Loma theosophists; the free lovers and eugenists; the cranks; and possibly the saints. What the author finds most astounding is how all of these fads were first accepted by superior people, by men and women of education, intelligence, breeding, wealth and experience before being adopted by the masses.« less