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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Power and Class in Political Fiction: Elite Theory and the Post-War Washington Novel

Power and Class in Political Fiction: Elite Theory and the Post-War Washington Novel

Smit, David

Paperback

Literary CriticismGeneral Political Science

ISBN10: 3030267717
ISBN13: 9783030267711
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Published: Sep 26 2020
Pages: 188
Weight: 0.53
Height: 0.42 Width: 5.83 Depth: 8.27
Language: English

This book introduces Elite Theory to the literary study of class as a framework for addressing issues of the nature of governance in political fiction. The book describes the historical development and major tenets of Elite Theory, and shows how each of four post-war Washington novels--Gore Vidal's Washington, D.C.; Allen Drury's Advise and Consent; Joan Didion's Democracy; and Ward Just's Echo House--illustrates the way class-based political elites exhibit forms of ruling-class consciousness and maintain their legitimacy in an ostensibly democratic form of government by promoting themselves as models of behavior, promulgating an ideology that justifies their rule through their control of the media, and accepting new members from the lower classes. Reading these novels through a socio-political lens, David Smit offers suggestions for ways to work for a more just and equitable society in light of what this analysis reveals about the culture that produces our political elites.

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