A short life of the author
Eric Schlosser (b. 1959) was born on 17 August 1959 in New York City. He studied American history at Princeton University and British imperial history at Oxford. He is a correspondent for The Atlantic.
Life and Career
Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal (2001) — which began as a two-part article for Rolling Stone — investigated every aspect of the fast food industry: the targeting of children through marketing, the industrial production of flavour chemicals, the conditions in meatpacking plants (where workers suffer injury rates higher than in any other American industry), the consolidation of agriculture, and the global spread of the American fast food model. The book spent two years on the New York Times bestseller list and was adapted into a 2006 film by Richard Linklater.
Reefer Madness: Sex, Drugs, and Cheap Labor in the American Black Market (2003) — about marijuana, migrant labour, and pornography — examined three American underground economies.
Command and Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident, and the Illusion of Safety (2013) — which tells the story of a 1980 Titan II missile accident in Damascus, Arkansas, alongside a history of nuclear weapons safety — was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in History. It documented dozens of near-catastrophic nuclear weapons accidents that the American public had never heard of.
Major Works and Themes
Schlosser’s method is to take a system that Americans take for granted — fast food, nuclear deterrence — and reveal its hidden mechanics, human costs, and systemic risks. His reporting is exhaustive, his writing accessible, and his moral commitments clear without being preachy.
Key Works
- Fast Food Nation (2001)
- Command and Control (2013)
- Reefer Madness (2003)
Collecting Schlosser
Fast Food Nation (2001, Houghton Mifflin) brings $15–$40. Command and Control (2013, Penguin Press) brings $10–$30.