Direct effect of Donald Trump’s return to the White House? The American press agency The Associated Press (AP) noted, on Friday, November 8, an increase in sales of dystopias, fictions based on imaginary societies governed by a totalitarian power or a harmful ideology.
First in bookstores. Shannon DeVito, director of books at Barnes & Noble, said: “Sales of fiction and non-fiction books tackling fascism, feminism, dystopian worlds, and left- and right-wing politics have soared with the election results. »
This enthusiasm has also been proven in online sales on Amazon. The Scarlet Maiden (McClelland and Stewart, 1985), Margaret Atwood’s great classic of the genre, adapted into a television series by Bruce Miller, is the most obvious example. The story revolves around the repression of women within the framework of a formidable dictatorship. Sterility has struck them and their world is now divided between the Wives, who dominate the house, the Marthas, who maintain it, and the Handmaids, whose role is dedicated to reproduction. After recording record sales during Trump’s first term, this dystopia rose to fame on the list of most purchased books on Amazon as soon as the results of the US presidential elections were made public.
Preview of pro-Trump books
AP points out that other dark and futuristic stories like the visionary 1984 (Secker & Warburg, 1949), by George Orwell – in which human beings are watched day and night–, or even Fahrenheit 451 (Ballantine Books, 1953) by Ray Bradbury – which describes a world in which books are banned and must be burned – also appeared on Amazon’s top 40 bestseller list on Thursday afternoon, November 7. Another bestseller from Trump’s previous term, Tyranny. Twenty lessons of the 20thmy century (Gallimard, 2017), by Timothy Snyder, reached the top 10 best sellers.
As expected, pro-Trump books sold like hot cakes. Published in early October, the memoirs of Republican wife Melania Trump, Melania (Skyhorse Publishing, 256 pages, 37 euros), made spectacular progress to take the lead in sales on the Amazon list, on Thursday, November 7, while peasant elegy (Globo Editions, 2016), signed by Vice President-elect JD Vance, makes the top 10. This work, which deals in particular with the socioeconomic problems of his hometown, Middeltown (Ohio), had already established itself as a publishing success when it was launched in 2016. Mr. Trump’s book of photographs Save America I was in the top 30.
