Saturday 17 March 2012

Philip Roth, "Our Gang" (1971)

Roth has written very, very thinly veiled political satire. His novel focuses on US President Tricky Dixon, who has been preceded by Lyin' B. Johnson, and John F. Charisma. The first few chapters outline 'laugh-out-loud' policy discussions regarding the need for, and benefits of, extending voting rights to yet-to-be born children. An unforeseen consequence of the President's policy decision is a violent riot by Boy Scouts who have taken offence at Dixon's advocacy of sex (how else could babies be conceived?). Faced with a difficult decision, Tricky's advisors debate the best solution for the riot, and decide upon sending in the military, and shipping off the Scouts to a camp in Arizona. In the end, Tricky is assassinated, but bounces back to campaign in hell for the position of Devil.

The book started off with such promise, but forty years after the fact, with Nixon dead, and with moral and ethical errors by politicians seeming to be the norm rather than the exception, the joke got stale before it hardly began.

This 1971 review captures the book well, although it is a bit more effusive than I would have been:
http://www.nytimes.com/books/98/10/11/specials/roth-gang.html

This review will give you a fairly good plot summary, in case you don't want to read the book yourself:
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/11846

No comments: