Errata
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Ever since George Bush used the word "evildoers," I've been thinking regularly of Robert Coover's 1977 novel The Public Burning. It's a tour de force of style and structure that combines American iconography with a dramatic, fanciful depiction of the week before the executions of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.

Coover writes entire chapters in the voice of Vice President Richard Nixon who ponders his place in the world and the similarities between his life and Julius's. Uncle Sam is a living, breathing folk hero, a rootin' tootin' westerner, fightin' fer liberty and justice against the wily Phantom who's always trying to take the country down.

Coover's characterization of America's collective attitude is so accurate and vivid that it has permanently colored my impression of national politics.

Posted by davis | Link