Who Will Buy Me This Book?

Just reissued: It Can't Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis. Written in 1935, it was the first book written by an US author to be awarded a Nobel Prize for literature. It is chillingly current...

When Windrip is elected, all hell breaks loose. Dissent is crushed, the Bill of Rights is gutted, war is declared (on Mexico), and labor camps are established to help shore up Windrip's vaunted ''New Freedom,'' which is more like a freedom from freedom. All that's really left of the old America are the flags and patriotic ditties, which for many is more than enough. But to Lewis it's not entirely the fault of those who will gladly abide America's principles being gutted. The blame also falls on the ''it can't happen here'' crowd, those yet to realize that being American doesn't change your human nature; whatever it is that attracts people to tyranny is in Americans like it's in anyone else.

Read the rest of the review here.

(Hat-tip: Pacific Views)