La nostra gang

by Philip Roth, Norman Gobetti (Translator)

Sul palcoscenico internazionale Trick E. Dixon e il suo gabinetto furoreggiano a suon di malefatte: in una crescente esasperazione grottesca della politica nixoniana, assistiamo all'invasione della Danimarca, al lancio dell'atomica su Copenaghen, a una rivolta di boy scout soffocata nel sangue. Fino a quando Dixon, giunto all'inferno, non proverà a soffiare il posto... a Satana in persona! Scritto di getto nella primavera del 1971, più di un anno prima dell'effrazione nella sede dei democratici al Watergate e ben tre anni prima delle dimissioni di Nixon, il quinto romanzo di Philip Roth procurò al suo autore l'appellativo di profeta. Immersione vertiginosa nella realtà americana degli anni Sessanta, La nostra gang è una fotografia spietata e sconcertante del linguaggio del potere e delle sue perversioni.

Genres: Fiction, Satire, Politics, Literary Fiction, American, Novels, Humor

184 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1971

About the author

Philip Milton Roth was an American novelist and short-story writer. Roth's fiction—often set in his birthplace of Newark, New Jersey—is known for its intensely autobiographical character, for philosophically and formally blurring the distinction between reality and fiction, for its "sensual, ingenious style" and for its provocative explorations of American identity. He first gained attention with the 1959 short story collection Goodbye, Columbus, which won the U.S. National Book Award for Fiction. Ten years later, he published the bestseller Portnoy's Complaint. Nathan Zuckerman, Roth's literary alter ego, narrates several of his books. A fictionalized Philip Roth narrates some of his others, such as the alternate history The Plot Against America.
Roth was one of the most honored American writers of his generation. He received the National Book Critics Circle award for The Counterlife, the PEN/Faulkner Award for Operation Shylock, The Human Stain, and Everyman, a second National Book Award for Sabbath's Theater, and the Pulitzer Prize for American Pastoral. In 2005, the Library of America began publishing his complete works, making him the second author so anthologized while still living, after Eudora Welty. Harold Bloom named him one of the four greatest American novelists of his day, along with Cormac McCarthy, Thomas Pynchon, and Don DeLillo. In 2001, Roth received the inaugural Franz Kafka Prize in Prague.

Reviews

[Michael Finocchiaro · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book today and to be honest, it was terrifying. Yes, Tricky Dick is long in the grave (and apparently trying to usurp Satan if we believe Roth), but the scenario of the book is so close to the insanity of Drumpf that it made me want to scream. Whether it was the horrifying week in Washington with the ever-insistent attacks on democratic process even before taking office or his public speeches (or his fucking tweets), everything about Drumpf is present in Roth's Tricky B. Dixon in spades. Like in The Plot Against America, Roth called this one 46 years ago. It is a darkly comic book, not Roth's finest, but perhaps, if you are not on suicide watch, it is a worthy read to see that, well, we had an inept, racist, sexist, homophobic, anti-abortion president at one time and he was kicked out of the office. Will history be able to repeat itself? I surely hope so. Just wait until he starts firing into crowds of Boy Scouts like Dixon does in the book, won't that be a gas? Fuck.
Yeah, we are already there - this book plus The Plot Against America were clear warnings which we missed...
RIP (1933-2018). One of America's literary giants has left us.

[Majenta · Rating 5 out of 5]

Re-read to commemorate the 50th Anniversary of Watergate...and...finding....too much relevance to the swirling sludge of today. I don't know what I was looking for when I happened to find it, but I'm glad I did.

[TK421 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Okay, I've had some time to think about this book. I know political satires are a dime-a-dozen, but this one works.

Here are my thoughts:

Even though it was written almost 40 years ago, and about a president that was less than decorous, I think it still has much clout concerning politics and politicians today. (That's both side of the aisle for those wondering.) We've seen how inadequate our elected officials are and, worse, just how incompetent they can be.

I think that was the point of this novel. Sure Nixon and his staff were easy targets. Watergate. Vietnamization. Peace talks that did anything but bring about a peaceful resolution. Even Nixon's personality provided all the fodder needed to razz and scorn a political system riff with moral ambiguity. That being said, Roth brilliantly evokes a sense of timelessness to this tale. He warns us that there is always going to be a Trick E. in the White House. And too boot, there is always going to be a supporting cast that bumbles through charade after charade trying to invoke a sense of righteousness for the American people via the Highest Office in the Land.

Political commentary aside, this novel was hilarious. In one episode, the National Guard battles the Boy Scouts of America. Three scouts are killed in the process and Trick E. tries to rationalize why the Guardsmen had a duty and right to defend themselves. I hate writing spoilers, so don't take my word for it and go and read this chapter in the book. It's chapter three. If you are not on the ground laughing, check your pulse.

In another instance, after Trick E. has been assassinated, the way Roth handles the political communications is priceless. I was only three when the Actor was shot, so I can't really give any firsthand accounts of what an attack on a president does to a nation, but I have seen how all the recent debacles from Clinton to Obama have been played out in the media. Whenever something happens, there are channels and channels of people trying to send out information. Not all of this information is true; sometimes, the information that is sent out is only a smoke screen to bide some time. Roth, through sardonic humor, illustrates this beautifully.

However, there is one downfall to this novel. In the last chapter Trick E. is debating Satan and is trying to show the demons of Hell that he would be a better leader than the Prince of Darkness. For me, this gets a bit heavy-handed. Instead of wrapping up a hilarious novel, Roth goes for one more joke and fails. Perhaps you’ll enjoy this chapter.

Because of all the laughs that the book provided, I am overlooking my criticisms and giving the book my highest honor: It will be reread in the future.

[Dave Schaafsma · Rating 3 out of 5]

“ . . . one ought to recognize that the present political chaos is connected with the decay of language. . . Political language--and with variations this is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to Anarchists--is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of respectability to pure wind.”

I am cautiously hopeful about the increasing legal challenges facing the former Cheeto-in- Chief, which made me nostalgic for the days in which an earlier version of this Demon created Chaos in American/World life and politics, leading to a satisfying conclusion. Philip Roth wrote this book in the early seventies, published in 1971, a year prior to Watergate--wait, is it possible some of y’all young-uns are a little fuzzy about just went down? Watergate refers to a break-in at the Democratic National Committee offices in the Watergate complex in Washington, carried out under the direction of White House employees. Disclosure of the White House involvement in the break-in and subsequent cover-up forced President Nixon to resign in 1974 to avoid impeachment.

But Phillip Roth, who like many of us, detested Nixon, after writing his comic sex romp, Portnoy’s Complaint, decided to go all Swift on us, ignited by this simple Nixonian statement:

“From personal and religious beliefs I consider abortions an unacceptable form of population control. Furthermore, unrestricted abortion policies, or abortion on-demand, I cannot square with my personal belief in the sanctity of human life—including the life of the yet unborn. For, surely, the unborn have rights also, recognized in law, recognized even in principles expounded by the United Nations.”

So Roth was inspired to write Our Gang by Nixon making this statement in the same week he ordered William Calley's (My Lai, who led the massacre of Vietnamese civilians, a war crime) release from prison to house arrest. The book is written entirely as dialogue, Imagining a President named Trick E. Dixon trying to get re-elected in 1972 by hook or. . . crook. A silly, over-the-top name, as are all others, as broad satire often warrants.

So folks such as Kissinger and Haldeman and Erlichman debate with Dixon how to get re-elected, using the abortion issue to distract from the VietNam war and the killing of JFK/MLK/RFK and civil rights riots, though Roth has no illusions about why Dixon adopts the anti-abortion issue--for political expediency, as we have seen today in the midterms as people shifted back and forth depending on how the political winds were blowing:

“I would be less than candid if I didn’t say that when election time rolls around, of course the embryos and fetuses of this country are likely to remember just who it was that struggled on their behalf, while others were addressing themselves to the more popular and fashionable issues of the day. I think they will remember who it was that devoted himself, in the midst of a war abroad and racial crisis at home, to making this country a fit place for the unborn to dwell in pride.”

Then things get weirder and weirder, as the group becomes "seriously troubled by the possibility that Lieutenant Calley may have committed an abortion" in killing pregnant women at My Lai. Nixon has essentially pardoned Calley, and now he’s an abortionist??! And on and on. Dixon orders the murder of Boy Scouts, protesting Nixon’s policies, and so it gets crazier and crazier, like Jewish lasers and murdering Democratic pedophiles in abandoned DC buildings. And so on.

The penultimate chapter has Dixon assassinated, but the last chapter is the best, the most rooted in the moment of the Quaker Nixon’s Presidency, having created one of the worst military disasters in American history and more. In the last chapter we see Dixon vying to replace Satan in Hell.

“Let me make one thing perfectly clear. Much as I respect and admire his (Satan’s] lies, I don’t think that lies are something to stand on. I think they are something to build on. I don’t think anyone, man or demon, can ever rely upon the lies he has told in the past, bold and audacious as they may have been at the time, to distort today’s realities. We live in an era of rapid and dramatic change. My own experience has shown that yesterday’s lies are just not going to confuse today’s problems. You cannot expect to mislead people next year the way you misled them a year ago, let alone a million years ago.”

And there’s more:

“Not even Satan, I think, with the support of all his legions, would claim that he could bring a nation with a strong democratic tradition and the highest standard of living in the world to utter ruination in only a thousand days. Indeed, despite my brief tenure in the ‘White’ House, I firmly believe that I was able to maintain and perpetuate all that was evil in American life when I came to power. Furthermore I think I can safely say that I was able to lay the groundwork for new oppressions and injustices and to sow seeds of bitterness and hatred between the races, the generations and the social classes that hopefully will plague the American people for years to come.” And on and on.

The book is about what Orwell was talking about, the decline of political discourse to the detriment of the country and the world. Lies embraced as truth for political gain. As Roth wrote in an article in Commentary in 1961, about that discourse in the era of late sixties Nixon, anticipating how things might get worse:

“It [i.e., reality] stupefies, it sickens, it infuriates, and finally it is even a kind of embarrassment to one’s meager imagination. The actuality is continually outdoing our talents.”

And boy did it get worse, underlining what Hegel said two hundred years ago: “We learn from history that we do not learn from history.” In Roth’s view no ludicrous satire could touch what we saw with Nixon and are seeing now.

I do not think the humor has exactly stood the test of time, and I don't love the over-the-topness of it all, but as one who survived Nixon and may survive Trump, I appreciated his Swiftian satire and his bow to Orwell and his embrace of democratic discourse.

PS: Nixon himself discussed Our Gang with his Chief of Staff H. R. Haldeman, who called it "ridiculous" and "sickening". Their conversations were preserved on Nixon's White House tapes. In other words, secretary Mary Jo Kopechne was not directed to erase this part of the Nixon tapes as she would later do to others.

[Davide · Rating 3 out of 5]

Facit indignatio versum (Giovenale)

Se non rientrasse nel progetto di ritradurre tutta l'opera di Philip Roth, forse questo libro non sarebbe stato ripescato, perché è molto direttamente legato alla storia americana di quegli anni (è del 1971): è una satira frontale, aggressiva contro il presidente Richard M. Nixon, qui ribattezzato Trick E. Dixon.
E visto che Trick significa "trucco, imbroglio, inganno, raggiro, frode" abbiamo già capito prima di iniziare a leggere dove Roth intende colpire.

Non è male, comunque, seguirlo mentre ricorrere a tutte le forme possibili di iperbole, deformazione, parodia, sarcasmo, gioco di parola e caricatura, che culminano - dopo la dichiarazione di guerra alla Danimarca e alla repressione dei pericolosissimi oppositori Boy Scout - nella campagna elettorale di Tricky all'inferno per prendere il posto di Satana.

[Ubik 2.0 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tricky Dicky Rides Again (J.Capaldi, 1974)
Negli ultimi anni, raschiando il cosiddetto “fondo del barile” della bibliografia di Philip Roth, mi capita spesso e non senza sorpresa di imbattermi in opere che presentano un assetto decisamente sperimentale rispetto ai più classici romanzi del maestro di Newark.
Prendiamo ad esempio questo “La nostra gang” (alias “Cosa bianca nostra”), che si può definire un assemblaggio di sei frammenti narrativi accomunati in una sorta di pamphlet contro la figura politica e umana di Richard Nixon, Presidente in carica degli Stati Uniti allorché l’opera fu pubblicata nel 1971: la metà di questi brani/capitoli è redatta in forma di sceneggiatura teatrale in atto unico, altri sono monologhi, uno (forse il più divertente) ha la veste di un reportage giornalistico o, per meglio dire, televisivo giacché diverse voci della stampa e della politica americana vi si alternano nei commenti al presunto grottesco decesso del Presidente.
Per apprezzare la valenza politica quasi profetica del libro di Roth occorre contestualizzare “La nostra gang”, pubblicato NON negli anni del Watergate, allorché l’insulto a Nixon era divenuto quasi lo sport nazionale fino alle dimissioni del Presidente alle soglie dell’impeachment, ma quando lo scandalo non era ancora alle porte e le accuse alla Casa Bianca liquidate dalla sua parte politica come pura propaganda (Nixon fu rieletto per il secondo mandato, poi inconcluso, l’anno dopo l’uscita del libro di Roth!).
Per quanto riguarda lo stile, lungi dal configurarsi come uno stucchevole e scontato atto di accusa diretto al malefico Nixon, tutto il libro è improntato ad un registro nettamente paradossale e grottesco, dall’accusa di complotto ad un noto giocatore di baseball all’attacco bellico alla Danimarca fino, come si diceva, alla comunicazione dell’improvvisa morte del Presidente in circostanze quanto meno stravaganti.
Immagino che, letta oggi in Italia, si perda parecchio dell’impatto originario dell’opera, non solo per la distanza temporale che ormai ci separa dagli eventi (…peraltro ritrovandoci 45 anni dopo con un individuo ancora più grottesco alla Presidenza!), ma anche perché tanti personaggi che attorniano Nixon in queste pagine (ministri, consiglieri, famosi giornalisti) sono dipinti con i loro tic e i loro caratteri, portati ovviamente al parossismo, che noi non siamo in grado di apprezzare, malgrado il supporto di un cospicuo pacchetto di note esplicative nell’edizione italiana.

[Djali · Rating 2 out of 5]

2,5 unicamente per la parte finale.

[Gauss74 · Rating 4 out of 5]

...e invece il politico di turno riesce a superare ogni immaginazione, soprattutto nello schifo. Siamo sempre nella parte della sterminata opera di Philip Roth dedicata alla satira degli Stati Uniti e del loro tempo, ed è evidente che la satira politica sia una tentazione irresistibile per il grande scrittore di Newark. Quello che bisogna tenere a mente però è che questo piccolo gioiellino è stato scritto molto PRIMA che lo scandalo del Watergate mostrasse al mondo la purulenta ed olezzante faccia del signor Nixon, probabilmente il peggior presidente della storia degli Stati Uniti. (ma se verrà eletto Trump probabilmente questo record è a forte rischio).
La satira politica se non è urticante non serve a niente, si sa, e Roth picchia durisimo ma con eleganza, in una divertentissima ma anche incazzevole sequenza di scene e strampalati discorsi del fu Trick E. Dixon, uno più ridicolo ed avvilente dell' altro. Cosa c'è di strano? C'è di strano che il vero Nixon nel frattempo riusciva a fare di meglio, superando in bassezza, crudeltà inutile, corruzione e volgarità persino l'immaginazione di uno dei più grandi romanzieri del Novecento.
L'effetto sull'America del tempo fu clamoroso. Al punto che ai tempi dello scandalo Watergate ci fu chi accusò Roth di essere coinvolto con l'amministrazione Nixon per essere arrivato a conoscere in dettaglio il volto occulto del presidente; senza contare che l'editore dell'epoca PRETESE che Roth scrivesse una introduzione ed un commento all'edizione di "La nostra gang" successiva allo scandalo, dove venisse almeno in parte spiegato un simile potere profetico. E mal gliene incolse, perche una richiesta simile ad uno scrittore del calibro di Roth significa tirare l'osso ad un cane feroce.
Che dire? Oltre ad essere un romanzo divertentissimo e scritto magnificamente, questa è un'opera di satira politica di altissimo livello, e che consente di capire benissimo che cosa diventi una superpotenza nucleare quando finisce nelle mani sbagliate: e anche solo per questo è una lettura quasi obbligatoria. Peraltro, ci consente di apprezzare una volta di più il grande dono che i detestabilissimi americani hanno fatto al mondo, quello di una democrazia matura. Una democrazia dove è possibile in concreto cacciare via l'uomo più potente della nazione per eccesso di bassezza morale, dove lo strumento di lotta politica è sempre non violeno ma non per questo meno efficace.
E in Italia? Noi non siamo in grado di essere all'altezza degli USA nè nel bene nè nel male. Certo per quel che riguarda il peggio ci siamo messi d'impegno, con politici incapaci e collusi con la mafia, toccando l'apice della bassezza morale con Berlusconi. Ma il Nixon che esce dalla penna di Roth è comunque su livelli decisamente diversi.
Quello che sconforta è la constatazione che il nostro stato non ha nè ha mai posseduto un Philip Roth, nè una satira su questi livelli come strumento di difesa. Non mi viene in mente neppure sforzandomi un libro di satira politica così ben scritto: gli sketch di Crozza in televisione, gli insulti e le minacce a chi ha un'idea diversa sono altra cosa.

[Fede La Lettrice · Rating 3 out of 5]

Satira estremamente esplicita, lucida e profetica contro il presidente degli Stati Uniti, al tempo in carica, Nixon.
Un libro divertente e che si presta a riflessioni che abbracciano l'intera politica, anche odierna; sicuramente datato se si prende in esame la specifica vicenda Nixon, ma attuale per molti altri versi generalizzabili.
Traspare la grande rabbia, per nulla trattenuta, dello scrittore che pubblicò questo racconto dopo aver visto rifiutato un suo articolo dal "New York Times" in quanto "di cattivo gusto". Mancano sicuramente le minuziose caratterizzazioni dei personaggi tanto (e per fortuna) tipiche di Roth e si sente la 'fretta' con cui scrisse.
Resta un libro spassoso e coraggioso (vorrei vedere Roth alle prese con un romanzo sulla situazione politica attuale degli USA), di piacevole lettura.

"Allenatore Legale: Ma non abbiamo nemmeno ancora deciso quale sarà esattamente l'accusa... come possono essere innocenti? Come lo dimostra? Dove sono le prove?."
Allenatore Politico: "In effetti prove non ne ho."
Allenatore Legale: "Allora, giovanotto, forse dovrebbe pensarci due volte prima di dare dell'innocente a qualcuno!"

"Tricky: Non voglio influenzare il voto, però questo lo voglio dire: non sottovalutiamo l'immaginazione del popolo americano... Penso sul serio che al popolo americano si possa far credere qualunque cosa. [...]
Ovviamente, signori, queste saranno elezioni libere. Prima di iniziare vorrei fosse ben chiaro che su questo sono inflessibile, eccetto quando c'è motivo di credere che la maggioranza dei voti possa andare dalla parte sbagliata."

La nostra gang
Philip Roth
Traduzione: Norman Gobetti
Editore: Einaudi
Pag: 173
Voto: 3/5

[Amirsaman · Rating 2 out of 5]

کتاب یه‌جور نمایشنامه‌ی رادیوییه به فرم هجویه‌ی سیاسی. مشکل من با کتاب استعاره‌ی رویی بود که درش استفاده شده بود (نیکسون می‌شه دیکسون مثلا. یا اون بخش جهنم و شیطان، که من رو یاد اپیزود صدام و ساتنِ سوث‌پارک انداخت). خیلی از ریویونویس‌ها گفته‌بودند که کتاب پیش‌بینی سیاسی ترامپ رو کرده و این حرف‌ها؛ ولی هر نوع متن کلی مثل این رو می‌شه به وقایع فعلی ربط داد.
مثلا نیمه‌ی اول کتاب، به خوبی __مغالطه__ و توجیه‌گریِ سیاسی رو نشون می‌ده، که کلی سیاستمدار --از آمریکایی تا ایرانی-- رو به ذهن متبادر می‌کنه. یا مفهوم پوپولیسمِ پیش‌پاافتاده رو به خوبی توی کتاب می‌بینیم.
این کتاب هم که یه سال قبل از کتاب The Breast نوشته شده، از فرم‌های غیررئال و سَتیرگونه استفاده می‌کنه. من کتاب‌های واقع‌گراتر راث رو بیشتر دوست دارم.

[Read By RodKelly · Rating 3 out of 5]

While there are some genuinely funny moments here, this book is mostly unsuccessful and out-dated. I appreciated reading it to track how Roth's writing continued to develop post-Portnoy, but, though the writing itself is stellar, the satire lacked any sort of contemporary bite.

[Jackson · Rating 3 out of 5]

required reading for political satire focus group of the mugdown

[Derek · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this in one sitting, taking a six hour bus ride from Queen Elizabeth National Park to Kampala. I can never read for more than an hour or so, especially on buses - crying kids, no AC, loud lingala on the stereo, but not with this book. Read it right through, no hiccups.

Our Gang is quite the humourous satire of 1970s America. The President's called Trick E Dixon, Vice President's called Blurb, etc. It's not funny haha, but it keeps you giggling all through. The writing is typical Philip Roth, smooth, short, succinct, a little highbrow, but all the way interesting.

[Lee Foust · Rating 4 out of 5]

Living in an era of the non scandal--whitewater to Benghazi--while the real scandals go unnoticed--how many hundreds of William Calleys have gone unseen, un-prosecuted, and ignored in Iraq or Afghanistan? How come Clinton's cigar-placement is a scandal but his sending bombers to devastate civilian populations in Europe in order to halt the genocide of other civilian populations is presented to us as a just and even leftist (once they were called doves--another endangered species) strategy? So, as we decide, as a nation, to stock up on guns in the name of freedom but willingly sacrifice privacy and dignity (at the airport), and to send guns to heartless heart-eating Syrian rebels (check that out on youtube--ew) I spied this little piece of paperback American parody circa 1971 in the infamous "Watergate edition" in my favorite usedbookstore and flipped through it gleefully out by the pool waiting for the summer heat to finally kick in and get me into the water. Perfect.

Yes, doubly-great that Roth spoofed Tricky Dick BEFORE his re-election, BEFORE his utter disgrace, and BEFORE the non-apocalypse of his whimpering surrender of the reigns of state to (as Gil Scott-Heron calls him, deliciously) Oatmeal Man. And it's been a version, more or less, of Oatmeal man ever since. I'm pretty sure that Nixon will go down in history as the last of the great liars, the last actual controversy, the last schemer, the last interesting US president. It's all oatmeal from now on as America removes its dentures for a permanent political dotage.

However, don't think that Our Gang really satirizes Nixon--well, it does, but rather indirectly, and most brilliantly, and aims for and hits spot-on the reason why we now live in an era of 24 hour news but know less than nothing about anything anymore. I continue to shock dinner parties by asking people why Bin Laden attacked the USA on September 11th. Although we've heard nothing but words about it for years now, no one seems to know anything about it. Go figure. Why is that? Well, guess who might be qualified to tell us, if not the entertainment-run news services? Writers, for heaven's sake, because they too, like politicians, work with words and understand how we use words to manipulate feelings and how to make scandals out of thin air, heroes out of idiots who sit and stare while the country is being attacked, and political martyrs out of paranoid schizophrenics completely corrupted and entrenched in fear by their own power--the curse of getting what they always thought they wanted.

What I'm getting at here is to say that Our Gang is all about rhetoric, political rhetoric, the ability of those holding a discourse, those talking heads, to spin us around and around imaginary bubbles of innuendo and obfuscation until we accuse a pregnant Vietnamese villager of coercing Willian Calley into performing an abortion-on-demand because he slaughtered her along with her whole village. Yes, that's where this novel begins--and it ends with Nixon's campaign speech in Hell running against Satan for the coveted office of Devil. Yes, the Devil that you don't yet know...

PS--Did you ever notice that president Obama also begins every sentence with "And let me make this perfectly clear..."?

[Ryan · Rating 1 out of 5]

I don't give 1s or 2s lightly when it comes to books and I definitely don't give them often, mostly because I'm generally pretty good at screening what I read well enough that I'm not likely to waste my time on a truly bad book, but when reading a writer's entire output, as I sometimes like to do, it's occasionally unavoidable. Such was the case with this, Philip Roth's incredibly misguided satire of the Nixon administration. This is really less a novel than a play, which, while partly responsible for how bad the work is (none of Roth's usual complex sentences and vivid descriptions), at least makes it a quick read.

What's so bad about it, then? In a word, nearly everything. The entire crux of the piece is the idea that Nixon's often professed beliefs in the sanctity of life and the rights of the unborn were at odds with his being a war-monger, typified by an early scene where Nixon-- excuse me, "Trick E. Dixon" (one of an endless barrage of punny names such as Peter Pious, Roger Rising-to-the-Occasion, Erect Severehead, etc., that are as unfunny as they are ubiquitous)-- is put on the spot about the prospect of one of the massacred women at My Lai possibly having been pregnant and thus subjected to an abortion of sorts. Roth then proceeds to belabor this point for the remainder of the text, while also working in an incredible number of "jokes" (to use the term in only the loosest sense) about "Dixon's" tendency to sweat profusely, lie, make reference to his past as a lawyer and his Quaker upbringing, etc. I never put a book down unfinished once I've started one, but this one was the stiffest challenge to that rule that I've had in years; it's the sort of comedy-- the worst sort-- that gives the impression of having been dated well before it was published, and 50 years later there is literally no reason to read it unless, like I'm doing, you insist on reading every book Roth wrote, or if perhaps you're some sort of scholar researching satirical works about Nixon or something. (Or if you're a true blue masochist.) In the biography I'm reading of Roth, it's mentioned that he was attempting something in the tradition of Jonathan Swift (a quote from whom opens the work), which underscores his failure: A Modest Proposal this is not. Respect the intention, but the results are staggeringly bad.

[Ryan · Rating 2 out of 5]

A sketch stretched to feature length.

[Old Man JP · Rating 3 out of 5]

A satire of the Nixon presidency. It was humorous at times but has become quite dated since it was written back in the 70's. Although, I must admit, some of the issues Roth made fun of are still relevant from the Trump years. This is not one of Roth's better books but I've been trying to read the few of his that I hadn't read yet for a You Tube video so I gave it a try.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

It helps to know about (or remember) the administration of Richard M. Nixon to laugh out loud as I did while reading Roth's great satire, but it's not necessary. Our Gang certainly satirized Nixon (as well as Spiro Agnew, several Democrats, and a cadre of famous news reporters and commentators), but far beyond that, it satirizes cynical political opportunism that uses rhetoric that sounds reasonable to twist reason into unrecognized train-wreckage, no matter the time or place.

The book opens with Trick E. Dixon's stated position in favor of the rights of the unborn (as actually stated in a quote from Richard M. Nixon at the beginning of the 1994 edition I read). He plans to show his support by introducing a Constitutional Amendment giving them the vote, expecting to secure their votes for himself. It rises to his "wag the dog" attack on Copenhagen, created to distract voters from a Boy Scout protest that he "decisively" stomps down. Dixon (unlike Nixon) is assassinated, but the double-talk or Orwellian White House Spokesmen and wily politicians deny the obvious until it can no longer be ignored.

Throughout, Dixon and his advisers pull all of the moves we might decry in today's politics. The media goes along blandly, asking predictable questions that allow more twisting of words into bits and pieces of good-sounding nonsense. One difference today is that more of the political operatives are part of the media today (think Limbaugh, Fox News). All is revealed as a circus of absurdity designed to distract voters from reality while consolidating power to Tricky Dixon (but name your least or most favorite politician or world leader to fill in the blank).

The final chapter of Roth's wonderful book might explain the post-Nixon rise of Fundamentalism in general and the Tea Party in particular. In the final chapter, Dixon has descended into Hell and debates Satan in an attempt to win an "election" for the office of Devil. To explain today's (fill in the Fundamentalist Political Movement of the Religion of Your Choice Here), Dixon must have won. His new programs are now evident amid the religious distortions, hypocrisy, and viciousness of this surging Fundamentalism.

Calling for "bold new programs in Evil that will overturn God's kingdom and plunge men into eternal death," he goes on to point out that a major part of the problem is that "at least one half of the people presently on earth...no longer believe in the existence of Hell, let alone its influence in world affairs. And maybe Satan is satisfied that the Devil, the highest official in the underworld, once the very symbol of nefariousness to millions, is considered in the upper regions to have absolutely no power at all over the decisions made there by men." Fundamentalists of every persuasion seem determined to re-connect us to concepts of the Devil, Satan, and the Evil influences of not-their-belief not-their-way-of-living. Dixon apparently won that election Roth hints at, and his minions are on the loose here and abroad, in terrorist circles and Tea Party hypocrisies, trying to get more than half of us to once again fear the Devil, as only the Devil would want us to do.

[Karenina]

Potrebbe sembrare un po' datato questo vecchio libro di Roth poiché parla, o meglio sparla, di Nixon ma, a parte il nome, la feroce satira sul potere ed i suoi disegni nascosti è purtroppo ancora attualissima. Un inizio sottotono me lo stava facendo abbandonare e sarebbe stato un peccato, il prosieguo si è rivelato ricco di quell'ironia pungente che ha reso celebre l'autore.

[Amir Guberstein · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book has not stood the test of time

[Morgan Baliviera · Rating 3 out of 5]

Una simpatica satira della presidenza Nixon.
Philip Roth immagina situazioni grottesche, imitando il linguaggio, la mimica e i modi di Richard Nixon: da una conferenza stampa sul tema dell’aborto alla guerra del Vietnam, passando per un’immaginaria (ed improbabile) guerra nucleare con la Danimarca, fino al suo assassinio e la diretta competizione con Satana per la leadership dell’Inferno.

[tortoise dreams · Rating 3 out of 5]

A book that hasn't aged well, but is still oddly prescient. And they thought Nixon was bad (he was, though they didn't know just how bad in 1971).

[Maurizio Manco · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Signori, io non sono un pivellino, lo so che in politica si gioca sporco. Ho visto ogni sorta di trucchi e raggiri: falsificazioni, mistificazioni, distorsioni, citazioni fuorvianti, nonché, ovviamente, sfacciate negazioni della verità. E le tecniche del linciaggio morale le conosco come le mie tasche." (p. 28)

[Jim · Rating 3 out of 5]

I never read Gulliver’s Travels growing up but for many years I assumed it was merely a children’s book like Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland not realising both were, in fact, satirical works, the former, a transparently anti-Whig satire whereas the latter lampooned the ordered, earnest world of Victorian England.

When George S. Kaufman proclaimed that “satire is what closes on Saturday night,” he was referring to its ephemeral quality: satire dates quickly. I would add that political satire dates twice as quickly. Probably because the painful realities it mocks are all too immediate, political satire seems particularly funny while it is fresh. But the intensity of satiric humour is often inversely proportional to its durability. Try looking at the opening monologue from last year's Tonight Show. We don't even get the jokes. Or look at any reruns of Saturday Night Live that bash then-current presidents. For every political satire that remains funny, there are a dozen that could be called Saturday Night Dead. – Elisabeth Weis, ‘M*A*S*H Notes’, Play It Again, Sam: Retakes on Remakes, p.311

There is no doubt that Philip Roth’s novel Our Gang is dated. I was thirteen at the time of the Watergate scandal and although I took note—it was hard to ignore even here in the UK—I can’t say I was especially interested or cared that much. I knew who Nixon was but I didn’t know anything about him. That was not the case in the Roth household: “Richard Nixon was known as a crook in our kitchen twenty-odd years before this dawned on the majority of Americans as a real possibility.” (Conversations with Philip Roth, p.87) In Reading Myself And Others he wrote: “The wonder of Nixon (and contemporary America) is that a man so transparently fraudulent, if not on the edge of mental disorder, could ever have won the confidence and approval of a people who generally require at least a little something of the ‘human touch’ in their leaders.” Sound familiar?

This book should’ve had its day. That it hasn’t underlines what Hegel said two hundred years ago: “We learn from history that we do not learn from history.”

Okay there’s a lot people won’t get here, the specifics, but the gist will be all too familiar, as Roth put it, “the fine art of governmental lying” (Conversations with Philip Roth, p.54):

[L]et’s not underestimate the imagination of the American people. This may seem like old-fashioned patriotism such as isn’t in fashion any more, but I have the highest regard for their imagination and I always have. Why, I actually think the American people can be made to believe anything.

Roth takes as his jumping off point a statement Nixon released in San Clemente on April 3rd 1971:

From personal and religious beliefs I consider abortions an unacceptable form of population control. Furthermore, unrestricted abortion policies, or abortion on demand, I cannot square with my personal belief in the sanctity of human life including the life of the yet unborn. for, surely, the unborn have rights also, recognized in law, recognized even in principles expounded by the United Nations. – Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Richard M. Nixon, 1971, p.500

In the book the president, Trick E. Dixon, has strong views about the rights of the unborn:

I will not be intimidated by extremists or militants or violent fanatics from bringing justice and equality to those who live in the womb. And let me make one thing more perfectly clear: I am not just talking about the rights of the foetus. I am talking about the microscopic embryos as well. If ever there was a group in this country that was “disadvantaged,” in the sense that they are utterly without representation or a voice in our national government, it is not the blacks or the Puerto Ricans or the hippies or what-have-you, all of whom have their spokesmen, but these infinitesimal creatures up there on the placenta.

Sounds commendable enough until you realise what’s driving him, the desire to be re-elected. He proposes to “extend the vote to the unborn in time for the ‘72 elections.” It’s ludicrous of course but that’s the whole point.

I would be less than candid if I didn’t say that when election time rolls around, of course the embryos and foetuses of this country are likely to remember just who it was that struggled in their behalf, while others were addressing themselves to the more popular and fashionable issues of the day. I think they will remember who it was that devoted himself, in the midst of a war abroad and racial crisis at home, to making this country a fit place for the unborn to dwell in pride.

Satire is meant to be over the top—just look at something like Spitting Image—but there is always a danger that the important message gets lost along the way. That said, Dwight McDonald, in his review for The New York Times in 1971 wrote, “Of course it's all very exaggerated, one-sided, fantastic, etc. Common sense tells us that. But common sense is, as often, wrong.” He then goes on to quote Jules Feiffer from a interview he did with Playboy: “That's all satire is—creating a logical argument that, followed to its end, is absurd. . . . Satire concerns itself with logically extending a premise to its totally insane conclusion, thus forcing onto an audience certain unwelcome awarenesses.”

To that end the book ends with Dixon in hell having been assassinated and although the rest of the book has lost its edge this final chapter is razor sharp. Dixon, feeling that Satan could’ve done a better job, has decided to run for the position of Devil. The whole chapter in which he addressed the Fallen is worth quoting but I’ll content myself with three brief excerpts:

[L]et me make one thing perfectly clear. Much as I respect and admire his lies, I don’t think that lies are something to stand on. I think they are something to build on. I don’t think anyone, man or demon, can ever rely upon the lies he has told in the past, bold and audacious as they may have been at the time, to distort today’s realities. We live in an era of rapid and dramatic change. My own experience has shown that yesterday’s lies are just not going to confuse today’s problems. You cannot expect to mislead people next year the way you misled them a year ago, let alone a million years ago.

[…]

[N]ot even Satan, I think, with the support of all his legions, would claim that he could bring a nation with a strong democratic tradition and the highest standard of living in the world to utter ruination in only a thousand days. Indeed, despite my brief tenure in the “White” House, I firmly believe that I was able to maintain and perpetuate all that was evil in American life when I came to power. Furthermore I think I can safely say that I was able to lay the groundwork for new oppressions and injustices and to sow seeds of bitterness and hatred between the races, the generations and the social classes that hopefully will plague the American people for years to come. Surely I did nothing whatsoever to decrease the eventuality of a nuclear holocaust, but rather continued to make progress in that direction by maintaining policies of belligerence, aggression and subversion around the globe.

[…]

[L]et me say, as regards [those] wholly unfounded attacks upon my bad name, that I intend, after this broadcast, to issue a black paper, showing that in every single instance where they claim I was “humane” or “benevolent,” I was in actual fact motivated solely by political self-interest, and acted with utter indifference, if not outright contempt and cynicism, for the welfare of anybody other than myself.

If you’re going to read this read it now. It’s never been more timely and Christ knows how much time you’ll have left to read it.

If you’re interested in Nixon’s own response to the book you should read Jon Wiener’s article in the Los Angeles Review of Books which includes excerpts from the White House tapes from February 1971 to July 1973.

[Dan Graser · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a a genuine laugh-out-loud work of relentless satire from Roth, targeting the machinations in the final days of the presidency of Trick E. Dixon. From his heartfelt notion of the sanctity of life for the unborn (but for no one living in southeast Asia), his solution to the protests against him by the Boy Scouts (imprison them, shoot them), his gripping "there's something rotten in the state of Denmark" speech before his - SPOILER ALERT - destruction of the "pro-pornography regime of Copenhagen," and his final campaign speech to become the new president of hell. Filled with face-palm worthy puns, an assiduously adept and alliterative VP, a press secretary so full of spin that the job is actually called the Bilge Secretary, and reporter names that seem to be pulled from Colin Mochrie on Whose Line is it Anyway, we are left, as Roth notes: "if not stronger, wiser; and if not wiser, stronger; and if, alas, not either, both." (as an example, that report was delivered by famed correspondent Erect Severehead)

Though of course any satire dealing with the presidency has lost some of its bite given what is now allowed and expected of the commander in chief (why just today he sided with an ex-KGB agent turned dictator against US Intelligence), the fact that this was written in 1971 and is so perfectly accurate in 2018 is a testament to Roth's powers of satire and our political system's power to never change. The spin and stupidity becomes so overwhelming that I will conclude this review with the final report from the aforementioned correspondent:
"Blah blah blah blah blah blah fulfillment of the Ameriblah blah blah blah blah blah. Blah blah blah one hundred years ago. Blah blah blah blah of Galilee. And yet those who would surrender hope blah blah blah blah blah. Blah blah blah blah cherry blossoms. Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah before him. Blah blah blah the people. Blah blah blah blah blah nation's capital."

[Richard Thompson · Rating 2 out of 5]

I am a Nixon hater from way back, and I like Philip Roth's writing, so I thought that this book would be a fun trip down my memory lane of Nixon bashing. Sometimes Mr. Roth is dead on in capturing Nixon's tone and rhythm, and the send up of the political speak and news speak of that era is also well done. But it just fell flat for me. It was too over the top to be funny. And what seemed extreme back in the seventies has sadly become standard operating procedure today. Plus I have mellowed on Nixon as I have gotten older. Yes, he was a liar and cheat. He used the presidency for personal and political advantage. And he took his sweet time getting out of Vietnam. But by today's standards, he was a moderate. He was a kind of Republican that I hated at the time but wish we had back today. And he did go to China.

[York · Rating 4 out of 5]

En cualquier otro momento este sería un libro de 3 estrellas. Pero en plena era de Donald Trump el libro se vuelve tan vigente, como brillante e incómodo. Es una recopilación de textos satíricos sobre Richard Nixon, el bufón, antes del escándalo del Watergate. Donde la caricatura de este presidente se dibuja absurda e inexplicable. ¿Cómo pudo ser presidente ese salvaje? es la pregunta que te haces, hasta que ves las noticias de este 2017....

[AlbertoD · Rating 4 out of 5]

Graffiante e raffinata satira politica che si fa beffe di Richard Nixon e del suo entourage, e più in generale prende di mira il linguaggio cinico e mistificatore di politici e di un certo giornalismo politicizzato americano. Sei capitoli che si leggono tutto d’un fiato, ognuno che vede il presidente americano districarsi in una situazione diversa (dalla conferenza stampa alla riunione di gabinetto al discorso alla nazione) e ciascuno caratterizzato da trovate divertenti e geniali.
Scritto nel 1971, in pieno primo mandato nixoniano, ma perfettamente applicabile anche a buona parte della classe politica, sia americana che europea, dei nostri tempi.

[iso · Rating 4 out of 5]

A timeless political satire. Or maybe - a better satire of the current administration than the one about which it was written. Granted I am no historian and I hardly know Nixon outside of watergate. Super funny and full of contradictions.

[Lila Clementine · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you know me you know I love Political satire. This was probably one of the best I’ve read in the genre. Every line a banger.