In her latest novel, Mania, iconoclastic author Lionel Shriver investigates the fallout around the fictional 2011 “Mental Parity Movement” in the United States in an alternative yet all too recognizable near past. Dubbed the “last great Civil Rights fight” by its progenitors, Americans now embrace the sacred, universal truth that there is no such thing as variable human intelligence: or, that there is no such thing as stupidity.
Gone are the days of university entrance exams, standardized testing and IQ, as well as the satisfaction of rising to the top of one’s field. Instead, children are expelled from primary school for using the “D-word” (dumb), and colleges, companies and government institutions have wholeheartedly embraced the broad cultural pivot to mediocrity.
The narrative centers around a rebellious and subversive college English instructor, Pearson Converse, and the lives of her family. Averse to dogma of all kinds after fleeing a restrictive childhood as a Jehovah’s Witness, Pearson is primed like no other to oppose the new cultural regime sweeping the nation. Made impotent in her own university classroom, she’s enraged by how the new system crushes ingenuity, creativity and intelligence.
Lionel Shriver is the award-winning author of We Need to Talk About Kevin (watch the trailer of the film adaption below) and numerous other works. She is also an outspoken commentator who has gained notoriety in recent years as she takes on the Culture Wars with her own pugnacious brand of contrarianism. But at the end of the day, Shriver believes that fiction is the best avenue to explore extremes, providing clarity on the world around us for better and worse, and is hailed as a master of her genre.
With echoes of Philip Roth’s The Human Stain told in Lionel Shriver’s inimitable voice, Mania is a sharp, acerbic and ruthlessly funny book about the road to a delusional, self-destructive egalitarianism. The John Adams Institute is keen to welcome Shriver as we delve into the dangers of elitism, polarization and the challenge of listening to diverging perspectives in a world where saying the wrong thing can have grave consequences. For a review of Mania (published by Atlas Contact in Dutch as Waanzin) in the Washington Post, click here.
Click here (paperback) or here (hardcover) to buy the book with a 10% discount at Athenaeum Boekhandel (use discount code JAI10%) 
