Sinclair Lewis’s novel of an American dictatorship, It Can’t Happen Here, seems even more timely today than when it was published in 1935. It tells of the election of Buzz Windrip as president, his seizure of absolute power, and how it affects people.

Windrip is so Trump-like you might think Lewis had a crystal ball looking into our present. He aims for total control while posturing as an ordinary, unassuming person. His platform is incoherent, laced with bigotry while appealing to the “Forgotten Man.” His Cabinet selections are based on personal loyalty. He has a personal police force, the “Minute Men,” to intimidate his critics. He even has an advisor who is smarter and more ruthless than he is.

What make’s Windrip’s success possible is the complacency and indifference of the American people. As he plainly says he’s going to reduce Congress to an advisory capacity, people think he’s just going to fix the country up. The novel’s main focus isn’t on the centers of power but on Doremus Jessup, the publisher of a small Vermont newspaper who’s trying to make sense of it all. This lets Lewis show how people react to Windrip before and after his takeover. Once he’s in office, he immediately suppresses the legislative and judicial branches, which give him no further trouble.

Lewis had seen what had happened in twentieth-century Russia, Germany, and Italy. He knew the USA wasn’t immune. Reading the novel gives a better understanding of what’s happening — and what could happen — today.