The Real Plot Against America

There’s a moment in the middle of Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America where the family has just learned that the father, Herman, is going to be transferred by his long-time employer, an insurance company, from Newark to somewhere in Kentucky. It’s very clear that the transfer is punitive, punishment for the father having crossed his sister-in-law, who is very connected with the fascist Lindbergh administration. The transfer order also looks a lot like simple ethnic cleansing, except that it’s framed as an “opportunity” that has been opened up by the Department of Interior, along the lines of the Homestead Act, where you get to be a pioneer in empty territory. But it’s all Jews who are being transferred. Though […]