Introduction

Summary

This Introduction surveys the long, inextricable relationship between American politics and the American novel in the twentieth century. After defining twentieth-century “politics” broadly as the theoretical intersection between power, freedom, and justice within the framework of American liberalism, it explains why the American novel is a unique aperture through which to view political conflict and change, arguing that the novel form illuminates how official power relations overlap with personal power relations. While surveying previous scholarship on American politics and the novel, it explains why the volume does not restrict itself to the narrow subgenre of “political fiction.” The Introduction then addresses the rationale for each major section: “Ideologies and Movements,” “The Politics of Genre and Form,” and “Case Studies.” It concludes by considering how a robust engagement with the politics of the twentieth-century American novel can help us make sense of our political present.