Sparknotes it can it happen here

Lewis was never much of an artist, but what he lacked in style he made up for with social observation. So Taccone and Bennett S. Peterson directed, and the adaptation opened at the Berkeley Rep on September 30th, four days after the first Presidential debate.

The result is a two-part production that has all the subtlety of a Donald Trump rally. This is theatre utterly lacking sanctimony and without many moments of quiet. It is a strange moment—theatre merging with the theatricality of American politics.

Utterly astonishing. Everyone of them seemed. Windrip receives the endorsement of Bishop Prang a stand-in for Father Coughlin, the hateful Depression-era preacher , thus conferring on him the kind of moral authority that Trump has sought, with dismaying success, from the Evangelical right.

The audience laughs, but the laughter is uneasy. It was not yet time for comedy. The second half, about the Windrip Presidency, is thrilling and grim. However, after he hears a story of a rabbi and a professor being murdered by a Windrip cabinet member, he takes action.

He writes an anti-Windrip editorial, which leads to his arrest by his old handyman, Shad Ledue, who now leads the local Minute Men. However, they are unable to cross the border and forced to turn back.

After several of his friends are sent to Trianon, the local concentration camp, Jessup quits at the paper and forms a cell of the New Underground, a Canada-based resistance group led by Walt Trowbridge.

Jessup, his lover Lorinda Pike , Buck Titus, and his daughters Mary and Sissy all become members of the cell, which publishes news critical of the regime and assists refugees fleeing to Canada.

While Jessup is imprisoned, his cell continues to operate, albeit in a diminished capacity. Ledue is then burned to death by the other prisoners. At the same time, the regime begins to buckle under the pressure of supporting the ever-growing Army and MM, as well as due to economic mismanagement and graft. By early , Windrip has become increasingly paranoid and power-hungry, and rebellions have begun in in the Midwest.

Sarason, becoming frustrated with Windrip, takes power in a bloodless coup. However, his weak and ostentatious rule quickly loses support and he is in turn deposed by Colonel Haik, the leader of the Minute Men. The rebels seize territory in the Midwest but then settle into a stalemate caused by the collapse of the education system.

However, Jessup becomes frustrated living in exile, and desires to return to America as a spy. At the concentration camp, Doremus is tortured and interrogated, but he resists giving up any information. This turmoil among leaders weakens the government, and a mass rebellion begins to rise throughout the country. The rebels help Doremus escape imprisonment, and he escapes to Canada.

He then volunteers to work as a spy for the rebellion, so at the end of the novel, he returns to America to help with the fight against the fascist regime. Read more from the Study Guide. Browse all BookRags Study Guides. All rights reserved. Toggle navigation. Sign Up. Sign In. View the Study Pack. View the Lesson Plans. Plot Summary. Chapters 1 — 7. Chapters 8 —