The Plot Against America
OCLC 56804910 | |
The Plot Against America is a novel by
Plot
The novel is told from the point of view of Roth as a child growing up in
Although criticized from the left and feared by most
Lindbergh's first act is to sign a treaty with Nazi Germany that promises that the United States will not interfere with German expansion in Europe, known as the "Iceland Understanding," and another with Imperial Japan that promises noninterference with Japanese expansion in Asia, known as the "Hawaii Understanding."
The new presidency begins to take a toll on Philip's family. Philip's cousin Alvin joins the Canadian Army to fight in Europe. Alvin loses his leg in combat and returns home with his ideals destroyed. He leaves the family and becomes a racketeer in Philadelphia. A new government program, the Office of American Absorption (OAA), begins to take Jewish boys to spend a period of time living with exchange families in the South and Midwest to "Americanize" them. Philip's older brother Sandy is one of the boys selected, and after spending time on a farm in Kentucky under the OAA's "Just Folks" program, he comes home showing contempt for his family, calling them "ghetto Jews."
Philip's aunt, Evelyn Finkel, marries Rabbi Bengelsdorf and becomes a frequent guest of the Lindbergh White House. Her attendance of a state dinner party for German Foreign Minister
In protest against the new act, the radio personality
As President Lindbergh is returning from delivering a speech in Louisville on October 7, 1942, his plane goes missing. Ground searches produce no results, and Vice President Wheeler assumes the presidency.
Seldon calls the Roths when his mother does not come home from work. They later discover that Seldon's mother was killed by Ku Klux Klan members who beat and robbed her before setting fire to her car with her in it. The Roths eventually call Sandy's exchange family in Kentucky and have them keep Seldon safe until Philip's father and brother retrieve him. Months later, Seldon is taken in by his mother's sister. The rioting stops when First Lady Anne Morrow Lindbergh makes a statement that asks for the country to stop the violence and move forward. With the end of the search for President Lindbergh, former President Roosevelt runs as an emergency bipartisan presidential candidate in November 1942 and is re-elected. Months later, the Japanese attack Pearl Harbor, and the US enters the war.
Aunt Evelyn recounts a theory of Lindbergh's disappearance, the source for which is First Lady Lindbergh, who disclosed the details to Evelyn's husband, Rabbi Bengelsdorf, shortly before she was forcibly removed from the White House and held prisoner in the psychiatric ward at
Inspiration
Roth stated that the idea for the novel came to him while he was reading the unpublished
The novel depicts an antisemitic United States in the 1940s. Roth had written in his autobiography, The Facts, of the racial and antisemitic tensions that were a part of his childhood in Newark. Several times in that book, he describes children in his neighborhood being violently attacked simply because they were Jewish.
Reception
Roth's novel was generally well received. Jonathan Yardley of The Washington Post, exploring the book's treatment of Lindbergh in some depth, calls the book "painfully moving" and a "genuinely American story."[2]
The New York Times review described the book as "a terrific political novel" as well as "sinister, vivid, dreamlike, preposterous and, at the same time, creepily plausible."[3]
Blake Morrison in The Guardian offered high praise: "The Plot Against America creates its reality magisterially, in long, fluid sentences that carry you beyond skepticism and with a quotidian attentiveness to sights and sounds, tastes and smells, surnames and nicknames and brandnames—an accumulation of petits faits vrais—that dissolves any residual disbelief."[4]
Writer
Many took the novel as something of a
In 2005, the novel won the
Analysis
Antisemitism
The similarities between modern anti-Zionism in western countries and the antisemitic policy decisions of the 20th-century Lindbergh government in the novel are highlighted by Jewish writer Mike Berger.[11] Berger discusses how in both situations, the targeting and ostracization of the Jewish population is masked in government and high society by making the criticism of Jewish people appear reasonable in focusing on their isolation and failure to assimilate with the majority white culture.[11] From this implicit condoning of prejudice against Jewish communities, many antisemitic individuals and groups become emboldened to carry out acts of violence and discriminate against Jews, as seen in the novel.[11]
English Professor T. Austin Graham argues that the gradual escalation of antisemitic government policy carries a lingering, dreadful possibility of full-scale holocaust across the novel.[12] He argues that the novel also shows how many Jewish families like the Roths are also severely affected by the major shift in the “collective American psyche” that leads to wide-scale rioting akin to the events of Kristallnacht in Nazi Germany.[12]
Identity
Mike Berger asserts that Roth captures the “essence” of Jewish identity in the novel with lines that describe the characters’ identities as being “as fundamental as having arteries and veins,'' contributing to an understanding of a “deep” identity as being the total merging of the individual and the collective.[11]
Trauma
The issue of trauma on a personal and group level is an important theme of the novel, which professor Aimee Pozorski believes is demonstrated by Roth's use of skewed time—“a kind of traumatic time that conflates the present moment with an unassimilated past”—to create the sense that the novel is a relived experience of a past trauma that may be able to offer new insights on the experience.[13] Pozorski states that the novel juxtaposes America's founding with the reality of its founding principles being torn apart to tell a reimagined Holocaust narrative.[13]
The novel's use of a child character as the principal point of view and the filtering of the novel's horrific events through the child's lens also highlights how future generations are more heavily impacted by traumatic events.[13] Such an impact could dramatically reshape personal and cultural identities.[13]
Historiography
Professor Jason Siegel claims that Roth wrote The Plot Against America in order to challenge the linear perception of history.[14] Rather than a single, objectively told narrative where every event serves a purpose, Roth proposes that historiography is characterized by the competition between conflicting “plots” and narratives aiming to forward agendas that suit the interests of those dealing with unresolved conflict in the present.[14] He does this by depicting how the battle between two alleged plots—the Jewish and fascist plots to take over the United States—shapes the course of the nation's future and impacts the perspective and experience of different social groups in different ways.[14] Roth redefines historical truth as the multiplicity of experiences and narratives of all people, and cautions that American history “remains perpetually unwritten and myriad."[14]
Parallels to the 2016 Presidential election
After the 2016 election of Donald Trump to the US presidency, reviewers noted the presence in The Plot Against America of a character who bears a resemblance to Trump. The cousin, Alvin, goes to work for a Jewish real-estate developer whose description closely matches Trump.[15] Roth was interviewed in The New Yorker about similarities between his novel and the election of Trump. Roth responded, "It is easier to comprehend the election of an imaginary President like Charles Lindbergh than an actual President like Donald Trump. Lindbergh, despite his Nazi sympathies and racist proclivities, was a great aviation hero ... Trump is just a con artist."[16]
Historical figures
The Plot Against America depicts or mentions many historical figures:
- Fiorello H. La Guardia: The mayor of New York City from 1934 to 1945.[17]In the novel, La Guardia gives a speech to the people of New York during the funeral of Walter Winchell in which he denounces the administration's silence on the epidemic of antisemitic rioting and warns against the rise of fascism in the United States by proclaiming “it is happening here!” He is later arrested for allegedly being a part of the conspiracy to assassinate President Lindbergh and is released when the Wheeler Administration backs down.
- Charles A. Lindbergh: A famous American aviator who at the last minute wins the Republican Party nomination and defeats Franklin D. Roosevelt to become the 33rd President of the United States. His anti-war platform and antisemitic views lead to the signing of peace agreements with the Axis powers and the increasing marginalization of Jewish Americans. Historically, Lindbergh was an outspoken leader of the America First committee of isolationists and accused Roosevelt and American Jews of being agitators for war.[17] He also made frequent trips to Nazi Germany and was criticized in American media for his antisemitic remarks and his praise of the Nazi regime, including his description of Adolf Hitler as “the world’s greatest safeguard against the spread of communism and its evils."[17]
- Anne Morrow Lindbergh: The wife of Charles Lindbergh who in the novel brings an end to the civil unrest and political crackdown brought about by her husband's disappearance with an appeal to her countrymen via radio address. The real-world kidnapping and murder of her three-year-old son is the subject of several conspiracies in the plot of the novel, with several characters accusing either the Jews or the Nazis of being behind the crime.
- secession crisis during the Civil War and barring him from joining the Army Air Corps after Pearl Harbor.[17]The novel ends with Roosevelt winning an emergency election for president and restoring history to its real course by entering into World War II on the side of the Allies after the Japanese attack Pearl Harbor.
- Burton K. Wheeler: A Democratic senator who becomes Lindbergh's running mate and is elected Vice President of the United States. When Lindbergh disappears in the novel, Wheeler's administration propagates a conspiracy theory blaming the Jewish community for the disappearance of Lindbergh and the kidnapping of his son several years prior and begins arresting prominent Jewish figures and members of the opposition. The historical Wheeler was a staunch isolationist and supporter of the America First Committee, who was accused of antisemitism in a political pamphlet also entitled The Plot Against America.[17][18] The veracity of these accusations are disputed by historians.[19][20][21]
- Walter Winchell: A famous Jewish gossip columnist and radio broadcaster from New York City who, in the novel and in real life, was a fierce critic of Charles Lindbergh.[17] His candidacy for the 1944 presidential election against President Lindbergh is cut short when he is assassinated at a rally in Louisville, Kentucky, exacerbating riots and antisemitic violence across the nation.
Television adaptation
On January 18, 2018, it was reported that
See also
- Business Plot
- alternative history.
- It Can't Happen Here: 1935 novel by Sinclair Lewis in which a demagogue defeats Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1936 and establishes totalitarian rule.
References
- ^ Solly, Meilan. "The True History Behind 'The Plot Against America'". Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved November 3, 2020.
- ^ Yardley, Jonathan (October 3, 2004). "Homeland Insecurity". The Washington Post. pp. BW02. Archived from the original on October 25, 2012. Retrieved May 4, 2024.
- ^ Berman, Paul (October 3, 2004). "The Plot Against America". The New York Times.
- ^ Morrison, Blake (October 2, 2004). "The Relentless Unforeseen". The Guardian. London, England. Retrieved July 21, 2010.
- ^ Kauffman, Bill (September 27, 2004). "Heil to the Chief". The American Conservative. Washington, D.C.: American Ideas Institute.
- ^ a b "Best Fiction". The Daily Telegraph. London, England. December 8, 2004. Retrieved January 3, 2011.
- ^ "Society of American Historians Prize for Historical Fiction (formerly known as the James Fenimore Cooper Prize)". Society of American Historians. Retrieved January 6, 2020.
- ^ "Sidewise: Past Winners and Finalists". Sidewise Awards for Alternate History. Retrieved January 6, 2020.
- ^ "John W. Campbell Memorial Award Finalists". Center for the Study of Science Fiction. Retrieved January 6, 2020.
- ^ "sfadb: Locus Awards 2005". science fiction awards database. Retrieved January 6, 2020.
- ^ a b c d Berger, Mike (2013). "Identity, Anti-Zionism and Antisemitism". Contemporary Literary Criticism. 336.
- ^ S2CID 162248859.
- ^ a b c d Pozorski, Aimee (2013). "Traumatic Realism, 'Afterwardsness,' and the Figure of the Child in The Plot against America". Contemporary Literary Criticism. 336.
- ^ S2CID 162142396.
- ^ Weisberg, Jacob (March 15, 2017). "A Dive Into The Plot Against America". Slate Magazine.
- ^ Thurman, Judith (January 23, 2017). "Philip Roth E-Mails on Trump". The New Yorker.
- ^ a b c d e f Solly, Meilan. "The True History Behind 'The Plot Against America'". Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved December 14, 2020.
- ^ "Wheeler's Progress: The Evolution of a Progressive", antiwar.com, May 1, 2009.
- ^ Seaton, Matt. "When Is a Nazi Salute Not a Nazi Salute?". New York Review of Books. Retrieved July 29, 2020.
- ^ Bill Kauffman, "Heil to the Chief", The American Conservative, September 27, 2004.
- ^ Johnson, Marc (January 2, 2021). "Montana Profile: The Montana Roots of "The Plot Against America"". Montana View. Retrieved December 11, 2022.
- ^ Holpuch, Amanda (January 16, 2018). "David Simon adapting Philip Roth's The Plot Against America for TV". The Guardian. Retrieved April 20, 2018.
- ^ Schaub, Michael (January 16, 2018). "David Simon is adapting Philip Roth's 'The Plot Against America' for television". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved April 20, 2018.
- New York Times. Retrieved April 20, 2018.
- ^ "HBO series based on Roth's 'Plot Against America' filmed in Jersey City with Winona Ryder and John Turturro. Next up: Newark". Nj. April 12, 2019.
- ^ Lawrence, Derek (December 19, 2019). "See Winona Ryder, John Turturro in first look at David Simon's The Plot Against America". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved December 19, 2019.
Sources
- Bresnan, Mark. "America First: Reading The Plot Against America in the Age of Trump." The Los Angeles Review of Books. September 11, 2016.
- Rossi, Umberto. "Philip Roth: Complotto contro l'America o complotto americano?", Pulp Libri #54 (March–April 2005), 4–7.
- Swirski, Peter. "It Can't Happen Here or Politics, Emotions, and Philip Roth's The Plot Against America." American Utopia and Social Engineering in Literature, Social Thought, and Political History. New York, Routledge, 2011.
- Stinson, John J. "'I Declare War': A New Street Game and New Grim Realities in Roth's The Plot Against America." ANQ: A Quarterly Journal of Short Articles, Notes and Reviews #22.1 (2009), 42–48.
External links
- Charles, Ron. "Lucky Lindy Unfortunate Jews", review in Christian Science Monitor, September 28, 2005. CSMonitor.com, accessed September 27, 2014.
- Gessen, Keith. "His Jewish Problem", review in New York Magazine, September 27, 2004. NYMag.com, accessed September 27, 2014.
- Kakutani, Michiko. "BOOKS OF THE TIMES; A Pro-Nazi President, A Family Feeling The Effects" review in The New York Times, September 21, 2004. NYTimes.com, accessed September 27, 2014.
- Risinger, Jacob. "Imagined History"Oxonian Review, December 15, 2004. OxonianReview.org, accessed September 27, 2014.