It Can't Happen Here

Zusatztext Written at white heat. Chicago Tribune Not only [Lewis's] most important book but one of the most important books ever produced in this country. The New Yorker Informationen zum Autor Sinclair Lewis Klappentext "The novel that foreshadowed Donald Trump's authoritarian appeal."-Salon It Can't Happen Here is the only one of Sinclair Lewis's later novels to match the power of Main Street! Babbitt! and Arrowsmith. A cautionary tale about the fragility of democracy! it is an alarming! eerily timeless look at how fascism could take hold in America. Written during the Great Depression! when the country was largely oblivious to Hitler's aggression! it juxtaposes sharp political satire with the chillingly realistic rise of a president who becomes a dictator to save the nation from welfare cheats! sex! crime! and a liberal press. Called "a message to thinking Americans" by the Springfield Republican when it was published in 1935! It Can't Happen Here is a shockingly prescient novel that remains as fresh and contemporary as today's news. With an Introduction by Michael Meyer and an Afterword by Gary Scharnhorst Leseprobe SINCLAIR LEWIS IT CAN'T HAPPEN HERE With an Introduction by Michael Meyer and a New Afterword by Gary Scharnhorst Table of Contents Introduction Sinclair Lewis enjoyed a brilliant career in the 1920s portraying and satirizing what he regarded as the mediocrity, materialism, corruption, and hypocrisy of middle-class life in the United States. His five major novels of the twenties Main Street (1920), Babbitt (1922), Arrowsmith (1925), Elmer Gantry (1927), and Dodsworth (1929)were all bestsellers that served to hold a mirror up to the parochialism and provincialism of that decade. A good many Americans winced at their own reflections in those novels, but they eagerly bought Lewis's iconoclastic books, because, however much they flinched at his representations of their middle-class lives, they were finally snugly, if not smugly, comfortable in the economic security that produced their prosperous confidence. After the stock market crash of 1929, however, there wasn't much left of the middle class of the early 1930s. Many who were previously solid, respectable breadwinners found themselves on bread lines, soup lines, and relief rolls. Normalcy, a twenties password synonymous with security, gave way to the jitters as profitless corporations laid off millions of workers who drifted across the country like Oklahoma farm dust. The popular song and exuberant theme of the twenties Ain't We Got Fun changed its tune to Brother Can You Spare a Dime during the Great Depression. Although Franklin Delano Roosevelt's first inaugural address in 1933 promised a New Deal, he also let his countrymen know what the score was in grim tones: Values have shrunken to fantastic levels; taxes have risen; our ability to pay has fallen; government of all kinds is faced by serious curtailment of income; the means of exchange are frozen in the currents of trade; the withered leaves of industrial enterprise lie on every side; farmers find no markets for their produce; the savings of many years in thousands of families are gone. Not surprisingly, the middle class was no longer interested in being discounted by bankers or by satirists. Lewis had to find new material. Given the stormy economic and social climate of the early 1930s, Lewis had plenty of other topics to consider that were more relevant than middle-class predispositions to be foolish and venal. He found a ready-made plot in the nervous undercurrent that accompanied the volatile politics of the period. With the rise of Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini in Europe and the alarming popularity of a variety of demagogues from both the left and ...

ldquo;Written at white heat.”—*Chicago Tribune

“Not only [Lewis's] most important book but one of the most important books ever produced in this country.”—*The New Yorker 

Autorentext

Sinclair Lewis

Klappentext

"The novel that foreshadowed Donald Trump's authoritarian appeal."-Salon

It Can't Happen Here is the only one of Sinclair Lewis's later novels to match the power of Main Street, Babbitt, and Arrowsmith. A cautionary tale about the fragility of democracy, it is an alarming, eerily timeless look at how fascism could take hold in America.

Written during the Great Depression, when the country was largely oblivious to Hitler's aggression, it juxtaposes sharp political satire with the chillingly realistic rise of a president who becomes a dictator to save the nation from welfare cheats, sex, crime, and a liberal press.

Called "a message to thinking Americans" by the Springfield Republican when it was published in 1935, It Can't Happen Here is a shockingly prescient novel that remains as fresh and contemporary as today's news.

With an Introduction by Michael Meyer
and an Afterword by Gary Scharnhorst

Zusammenfassung
“The novel that foreshadowed Donald Trump’s authoritarian appeal.”—Salon*

It Can’t Happen Here is the only one of Sinclair Lewis’s later novels to match the power of *Main Street, Babbitt, and Arrowsmith. A cautionary tale about the fragility of democracy, it is an alarming, eerily timeless look at how fascism could take hold in America.

Written during the Great Depression, when the country was largely oblivious to Hitler’s aggression, it juxtaposes sharp political satire with the chillingly realistic rise of a president who becomes a dictator to save the nation from welfare cheats, sex, crime, and a liberal press.

Called “a message to thinking Americans” by the Springfield Republican when it was published in 1935, It Can’t Happen Here is a shockingly prescient novel that remains as fresh and contemporary as today’s news.

With an Introduction by Michael Meyer
and an Afterword by Gary Scharnhorst

Leseprobe

SINCLAIR LEWIS

IT CAN’T
HAPPEN HERE

With an Introduction
by Michael Meyer
and a New Afterword
by Gary Scharnhorst

 

Table of Contents

Introduction

Sinclair Lewis enjoyed a brilliant career in the 1920s portraying and satirizing what he regarded as the mediocrity, materialism, corruption, and hypocrisy of middle-class life in the United States. His five major novels of the twenties—Main Street (1920), Babbitt (1922), Arrowsmith (1925), Elmer Gantry (1927), and Dodsworth (1929)—were all bestsellers that served to hold a mirror up to the parochialism and provincialism of that decade. A good many Americans winced at their own reflections in those novels, but they eagerly bought Lewis’s iconoclastic books, because, however much they flinched at his representations of their middle-class lives, they were finally snugly, if not smugly, comfortable in the economic security that produced their prosperous confidence.

After the stock market crash of 1929, however, there wasn’t much left of the middle class of the early 1930s. Many who were previously solid, respectable breadwinners found themselves on bread lines, soup lines, and relief rolls. “Normalcy,” a twenties password synonymous with security, gave way to the “jitters” as profitless corporations laid off millions of workers who drifted across the country like Oklahoma farm dust. The popular song and exuberant theme of the twenties “Ain’t We Got Fun” changed its tune to “Brother Can You Spare a Dime” during the Great Depression. Although Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s first inaugural address in 1933 promised a New Deal, he also let his countrymen know what the score was in grim tones:

Values have shrunken to fantastic levels; taxes have risen; our ability to pay has fallen; government of all kinds is faced by serious curtailment of inc…