IT CAN HAPPEN HERE: NAZI AMERICA

Grossman, Lev (2004) “The reign of Roth” TIME, 9/27, P.67-68.

In 1940, the Republican Party was considering drafting Charles Lindberg or Lucky Lindy, the fellow who was the first to cross the Atlantic Ocean by plane.

Lindberg was a Nazi or Nazi sympathizer. From this premise, noted author Phillip Roth has constructed amazing fiction called THE PLOT AGAINST AMERICA.

After Lindberg is elected, he makes executive decisions to stay out of World War II. Hitler succeeds in conquering Europe, but not Russia, and reigns supreme over what are called Western democracies today.

Young Jewish kids are given an “opportunity” to move with their parents to small towns. Jewish communities disappear and find themselves isolated in little towns all over the United States. From there, Roth shows how Jewish families with out their property and with professional degrees that may or may not handy in their new locations deal with everyday life. All of this is done by the OFFICE OF AMERICAN ABSORPTION.

This is not exactly new. Sinclair Lewis introduced IT CAN’T HAPPEN HERE. His scenario had a mythical character that had a Huey Long persona who became president and a Midwestern family who found them trying to sneak over the border into Canada to the facism of the USA.

The TIME review suggests that Roth’s THE PLOT AGAINST AMERICA is an excellent read.