Cynical science-fiction of the 1950s

@Arkturos said
Is it just me who might be thinking that some of those observations and predictions made back then might still be enacted now, so many decades later?

Ah, you mean, like Orwell's 1984 ? Yup, it's happening, just delayed by 4 decades.

@moonbus said
Ah, you mean, like Orwell's 1984 ? Yup, it's happening, just delayed by 4 decades.

“We know that no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it.”

@Arkturos said
Is it just me who might be thinking that some of those observations and predictions made back then might still be enacted now, so many decades later?

i bought a flying car
with tariff money left over
it's powered by pure hubris
two zen bumper stickers
and

wait for it



autopilot

@moonbus said
Ah, you mean, like Orwell's 1984 ? Yup, it's happening, just delayed by 4 decades.

It Can't Happen Here is a 1935 dystopian political novel by the American author Sinclair Lewis.[1] Set in a fictionalized version of the 1930s United States, it follows an American politician, Berzelius "Buzz" Windrip, who quickly rises to power to become the country's first outright dictator (in allusion to Adolf Hitler's rise to power in Nazi Germany), and Doremus Jessup, a newspaper editor who sees Windrip's fascist policies for what they are ahead of time and who becomes Windrip's most ardent critic.

It Can't Happen Here

First edition
Author
Sinclair Lewis
Language
English
Genre
Political fiction
Dystopian fiction
Publisher
Doubleday, Doran and Company
Publication date
October 21, 1935
Publication place
United States
Media type
Print (hardcover)
Pages
458 pp.
ISBN
045121658X
The novel was adapted into a play by Lewis and John C. Moffitt in 1936.[2]

Contents
Premise
edit
It Can't Happen Here was published during the heyday of fascism in Europe, which was reported on by Dorothy Thompson, Lewis's wife.[3] The novel describes the rise of Berzelius "Buzz" Windrip, a demagogue who is elected President of the United States, after fomenting fear and promising drastic economic and social reforms while promoting a return to patriotism and "traditional" values. After his election, Windrip takes complete control of the government via self-coup and imposes totalitarian rule with the help of a ruthless paramilitary force, in the manner of European fascists such as Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini. The novel's plot centers on journalist Doremus Jessup's opposition to the new regime and his subsequent struggle against it as part of a liberal rebellion.

Plot
edit
In 1936, American Senator Berzelius "Buzz" Windrip enters the presidential election campaign on a populist platform, promising to restore the country to prosperity and greatness, and promising each citizen US$5,000 per year (equivalent to $113,000 in 2024). Portraying himself as a champion of "the forgotten man" and "traditional" American values, Windrip defeats incumbent President Franklin D. Roosevelt for the Democratic nomination, and then beats his Republican opponent, Senator Walt Trowbridge, in the November election.

Having previously foreshadowed some authoritarian measures to reorganize the government, Windrip outlaws dissent, incarcerates political enemies in concentration camps, and trains and arms a paramilitary force called the "Minute Men" (named after the Revolutionary War militias of the same name), who terrorize citizens and enforce the policies of a corporatist regime. One of Windrip's first acts as president is to eliminate the influence of Congress, which draws the ire of many citizens as well as the legislators themselves. The Minute Men respond to protests harshly, attacking demonstrators with bayonets. In addition to these actions, Windrip's administration, known as the Corpo government, curtails women's and minority rights, and eliminates individual states by subdividing the country into administrative sectors. The government of these sectors is managed by Corpo authorities, usually prominent businessmen or Minute Men officers. Those accused of crimes against the government appear before kangaroo courts presided over by military judges. A majority of Americans approve of these dictatorial measures, seeing them as painful but necessary steps to restore American power.

Open opponents of Windrip, led by Senator Trowbridge, form an organization called the New Underground (named after the Underground Railroad), helping dissidents escape to Canada and distributing anti-Windrip propaganda. One recruit to the New Underground is Doremus Jessup, a traditional liberal and an opponent of both corporatism and communism, the latter being suppressed by Windrip's administration. Jessup's participation in the organization results in the publication of The Vermont Vigilance, a periodical in which he writes editorials decrying Windrip's abuses of power.

Shad Ledue, the local district commissioner and Jessup's former hired man, resents his old employer. After discovering Jessup's actions, Ledue has him sent to a concentration camp. Ledue terrorizes Jessup's family and particularly his daughter Sissy, whom he unsuccessfully attempts to seduce. Sissy discovers evidence of corrupt dealings on the part of Ledue, which she exposes to Francis Tasbrough, a one-time friend of Jessup and Ledue's superior in the administrative hierarchy. Tasbrough has Ledue imprisoned in the same camp as Jessup, where inmates sent there by Ledue organize his murder. Jessup eventually escapes when his friends bribe one of the camp guards. He flees to Canada and rejoins the New Underground. He later serves the organization as a spy, passing along information and urging locals to resist Windrip.

In time, Windrip's hold on power weakens as his promised economic prosperity fails to materialize, and increasing numbers of disillusioned Americans, including Vice President Perley Beecroft, flee the country. Windrip also angers his Secretary of State, Lee Sarason, who had served earlier as his chief political operative and adviser. Sarason and Windrip's other lieutenants, including General Dewey Haik, seize power and exile the president to France. Sarason succeeds Windrip, but his extravagant and relatively weak rule creates a power vacuum in which Haik and others vie for power. In a putsch, Haik leads a party of military supporters into the White House, kills Sarason and his associates, and proclaims himself president. The two coups cause a slow erosion of Corpo power. Haik's government tries to arouse patriotism by launching an invasion of Mexico, slandering the country in state-run newspapers and ordering a mass conscription of young American men, infuriating many who had until then been Corpo loyalists. Riots and rebellions break out across the country, with many realizing the Corpos have misled them.

General Emmanuel Coon, one of Haik's senior officers, defects to the opposition with a large portion of his army, giving strength to the resistance movement. Although Haik remains in control of much of the country, a new civil war soon breaks out as the resistance tries to consolidate its grasp on the Midwest. As the conflict begins, Jessup works as an agent for the New Underground in Corpo-occupied portions of southern Minnesota.

Reception
edit
Reviewers at the time,[4] and historians and literary critics ever since, have emphasized the resemblance to Louisiana politician Huey Long, who used strong-arm political tactics and who was building a nationwide "Share Our Wealth" organization in preparing to run for president in the 1936 election. Long was assassinated in 1935 just prior to the novel's publication.[5][6][7][8] The inspiration for Windrip backer Bishop Prang was renowned radio priest Charles Coughlin,[9][10] who in real life conspired with Long to oust Roosevelt in the 1936 U.S. presidential election.[11][10]


Poster for the stage adaptation of It Can't Happen Here, October 27, 1936, at the Lafayette Theater as part of the Detroit Federal Theatre

Poster for the Federal Theatre Project presentation of It Can't Happen Here at the Adelphi Theatre in New York City, showing the Statue of Liberty
According to Boulard (1998), "the most chilling and uncanny treatment of Huey by a writer came with Sinclair Lewis's It Can't Happen Here."[12] Lewis portrayed a genuine U.S. dictator on the Hitler model. Starting in 1936, the Works Progress Administration, a New Deal agency, performed the stage adaptation across the country; Lewis had the goal of hurting Long's chances in the 1936 election.[5]

Keith Perry argues that the key weakness of the novel is not that he decks out U.S. politicians with sinister European touches, but that he finally conceives of fascism and totalitarianism in terms of traditional U.S. political models rather than seeing them as introducing a new kind of society and a new kind of regime.[13] Windrip is less a Nazi than a con-man-plus-Rotarian, a manipulator who knows how to appeal to people's desperation, but neither he nor his followers are in the grip of the kind of world-transforming ideology like Hitler's Nazism.[14]

(Full copy of a Wikipedia text.)

@Kewpie said
90 years ago, Sinclair Lewis had access to a time machine.

when yer prescient, yer scary
you know that, right?

@Kewpie said
90 years ago, Sinclair Lewis had access to a time machine.

I never encountered this novel. Thanks for bringing it to our attention.

@Suzianne said
I never encountered this novel. Thanks for bringing it to our attention.

I imagine you are busy and have a tall reading stack for your primary focus/foci, but I'd also like to recommend Cyril M. Kornbluth (short-story writer from the 50s).

On my side, I'd kind of like to see something like Moorcock's "Dancers at the End of Time" presented somehow -- and along those lines I have in mind what Star Trek has been trying to do for decades, and also (perhaps surprisingly to some) Ayn Rand's "Romantic Manifesto" -- i.e., fictional or other artistic works that demonstrate how things could be.

@Arkturos said
I imagine you are busy and have a tall reading stack for your primary focus/foci, but I'd also like to recommend Cyril M. Kornbluth (short-story writer from the 50s).

On my side, I'd kind of like to see something like Moorcock's "Dancers at the End of Time" presented somehow -- and along those lines I have in mind what Star Trek has been trying to do for decades, and also ...[text shortened]... Romantic Manifesto" -- i.e., fictional or other artistic works that demonstrate how things could be.

I've read and enjoyed Moorcock, but I'm not inclined to listen to someone who claims that Ayn Rand is beneficial for anyone to read, let alone attempt to digest or curate. Her work is dystopian, at best.

@Suzianne said
I've read and enjoyed Moorcock, but I'm not inclined to listen to someone who claims that Ayn Rand is beneficial for anyone to read, let alone attempt to digest or curate. Her work is dystopian, at best.

So what?

Have you read any of Moorcock's "End of Time" novels or Rand's "Romantic Manifesto" in particular?

I doubt it.

May Heaven help your patients/clients.

@rookie54 said
have you watched any of the dystopian television fantasy "fallout"?

scary stuff
all that smoke that might happen


and then there's the reality in which we live and breathe, and make our futile individual attempts to survive

I found the Fallout series to be enjoyable, for what it is. It's a fun concept.

Dystopian society should be presented as something to be avoided, rather than held up as an ideal.

@Suzianne said
I found the Fallout series to be enjoyable, for what it is. It's a fun concept.

Dystopian society should be presented as something to be avoided, rather than held up as an ideal.

And then there's you -- the most dystopian forum participant anyone might ever hope to not meet.

So what's the game here? You got in early, therefore you are untouchable no badly how you might behave?

Camper.

@Arkturos said
So what?

Have you read any of Moorcock's "End of Time" novels or Rand's "Romantic Manifesto" in particular?

I doubt it.

May Heaven help your patients/clients.

Again, not listening.

Not a good habit at all.