It Almost Happened (and might still happen) Here: Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America

Abstract

For nearly a century, authors and artists have speculated about whether a fascist state could take root in the United States. Sinclair Lewis’s It Can’t Happen Here (1935/2014) and Robert Penn Warren’s All the King’s Men (1946/2002) were but two fictionalized examples of how an American-style dictator could emerge. Among the more recent entries in this genre was The Plot Against America (2005) by the novelist Philip Roth, which depicted what might happen if the U.S. elected the aviation pioneer and America First leader Charles Lindbergh as president in 1940. Having used the Roth book in my senior seminar for several years, I want to describe some of the educational themes to which it can apply. Also worthy of inclusion is the six-episode HBO miniseries, The Plot Against America (2020), produced and written by David Simon and Ed Burns. Though faithful to the book, the televised version differed in emphasis and tone, looking at the work more ironically and urgently in light of the presidency of Donald Trump.