The Plot Against America

 

Philip Roth's prize-winning The plot against America has several similarities to Jo Walton's Small Change series. Set in World War 2 America as opposed to Britain, Roth explores the chilling consequences of a fascinating “what if”. What if the right-wing, isolationist and anti-Semitic aviation hero Charles A. Lindburgh had defeated Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the 1940 US presidential election?

The plot against America is narrated from the perspective of a young Philip Roth and his family. In it he explores the virulent anti-Semitism of 1940's America.

President Lindburgh proceeds to lead America on the path towards fascism, signing treaties with both Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan promising that the US will stay out of their expansionist wars. He also enacts new laws to take Jewish youth from the east coast cities of the US to the rural Midwest and South to “Americanise” them.

Whilst there is no evidence that Lindburgh ever planned to run as president, he was a staunch isolationist and felt that “undesirable elements” of the US population were pushing America towards war.

The plot against America received rave reviews with the Library Journal stating that “Roth's take on alternative history is crafted with chilling plausibility” and that it is “[a] novel of fear and fearful possibility ...”


Roth, Philip. The plot against America, Sydney: Random House Australia, 2004.

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