'This is a dizzying moment for us and for the world': Douglas Kennedy speaks ahead of Donald Trump's return to the White House

Douglas Kennedy brilliantly illuminates Trump's America in his latest book, “Ailleurs chez moi” (Belfond). The American author granted us an interview at a time when the Republican is preparing to settle, once again, into the White House.

Your latest book, “Ailleurs chez moi” (Belfond), sheds a harsh light on this America that brought Trump to power. What are the driving forces behind his return to the White House on January 20th? ?

In my column in “La Tribune Dimanche”, I predicted Trump's victory. The Democratic Party believed that everyone would reason like their highly educated voters who saw him as a thug. Half the country thought otherwise.

There is a big problem in the United States today: populism and the fact that the middle class is afraid. Even though Biden has done a lot for the middle class, inflation is difficult. In Pennsylvania, a very important state, a voter explained that the price of eggs had doubled and that things were better with Trump. This is not true, but that is his point of view.

There is also a misogyny in the background. Clearly, the idea of ​​having a woman as president was too hard for many Americans to accept. But 52% of white women also voted for Trump. 52%! It’s extraordinary.

The far right, which is 15 to 20 percent of the people in the United States, is not the only one who voted for him, the middle class, the working class and many wealthy people too. The country has spoken, I don’t agree with that, but we have to accept it.

This is a dizzying moment for us and for the world, because Trump and the Republican Party are going to control Congress, the White House and the Supreme Court. This is not the immediate end of American democracy. We are waiting to see and I do not like pessimism, it is lazy. I study history and it is always made of cycles. We are now entering a difficult cycle.

Trump, a former reality TV figure, you recall, is the creature of Steve Bannon who wanted to make the Republican Party a working class movement, a mode of expression for white men.

Yes, Nixon, as early as 1968, divided the country in this way to recover the South which was still frankly Democratic because of the Civil War. Reagan used the same strategy and many working class Democrats began to vote for him, the middle class too. Even if the policies of the Republican Party destroyed the middle class, that is the irony.

I am neither left nor right, I am very centrist, I am not an activist, but an observer. The day after Trump's victory, I wrote this in my diary, thinking back to these words of Thomas Jefferson, our third president, very influenced by Voltaire and Rousseau, who wrote the Declaration of Independence: the government you elect is the government you deserve.

You are also an observer through your novels, in “Men Are Afraid of the Light” you explored the violence of the anti-abortion movements, do you fear setbacks on other societal rights, individual freedoms in the United States ?

Four years ago, I told my editor: my next novel will be about abortion and it was published in 2022, at the end of the Roe v. Wade decision, which challenged this right federally. Abortion will continue in the United States, but it is decided state by state.

I live in Maine, we have a Democratic governor, Janet Mills. This very centrist woman who has her feet on the ground has enshrined in law the right to have an abortion. But in Alabama, for example, it is the opposite, and I think that will continue with this very Catholic Supreme Court, these six conservative justices. Trump has them in his pocket. Clearly, same-sex marriage will also be targeted, as well as the separation between Church and State.

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What do you think of the nominations around Trump, the way he surrounds himself, and especially this leading role of Elon Musk at his side??

When you are close to Trump, everything can also explode. Look at Rudolph Giuliani, mayor of New York during 9/11, a national hero, who became Trump’s consigliere (smile): he is completely ruined now, found guilty in several trials. People close to Trump are often destroyed. As for Elon Musk, this completely arrogant billionaire, we will see what happens.

There are 881 billionaires in the United States, that’s a lot, including a certain Mr. Trump. The people who voted for him voted for billionaires at the same time. That’s also extraordinary. While we are in a situation where the middle class is struggling. My God, they are struggling! The American dream for me, honestly, was the fact that the middle class could buy a house, have a car, be a teacher in a school, work in a library and have a life where they can educate children. Now, that’s impossible. I grew up in the middle class of New York, she disappeared in Manhattan because life is too expensive, she is in the suburbs, it is a big change, and her daily life is not easy.

My optimism lets me think that with the midterm elections in the United States in two years, if the economy is zero and if the Republican Party has not completely changed its rules, we will perhaps end up having another Democratic congress. That is the hope.

To understand this America of Trump, you take us in your book to Kansas, along the Flint Hills Trail and you ask an essential question: what is an American ?

There are several Americans. Recently, on television, a young French writer said: in Texas, there are thugs. I answered: there are, you can carry weapons in public, but there are also extraordinary universities, researchers, the best hospital in the world in the fight against cancer, three great orchestras, I also know real intellectuals. It is neither black nor white.

Kansas is very interesting, I met very intelligent people there.

The truth is that I am afraid of my country. I am frustrated by my country. But I love my country.

Do these stereotypes conveyed, particularly in France, about Americans affect you?

In the United States, people say that the French are snobs and hate us. I have lived in France half the time since 2000, I am French-speaking now, with a slight accent, even if I make small mistakes.

I say to my fellow Americans: you are wrong, it is more complicated than that. I hate clichés because they are lazy. When you write, you have to find subtlety everywhere. In “In God's Country”, I recount a summer spent in the southern United States, in neo-Christian culture. I found myself in absolutely absurd situations, but I never made fun of the people I met. You have to respect people. Even if you don't agree. You have to try to understand. Otherwise you write things without much knowledge of the human condition.

What also makes your view of the United States in this book so strong is its approach, a political-historical analysis, through your own experience.

That’s what makes this book different, I hope. My father and my family is a great metaphor for this country. Why does God play such an important role in American life? ? Why is money our civil religion? ? The book asks a lot of unanswered questions. It’s one of my obsessions.

I hate people who think they have the truth, they’re too Manichean. In my experience, there is no truth. There are certain things we agree on, genocide is horrible. But many other ethnic and moral things are gray.

I've lived a lot of lives, marriage, children who are adults now, 32 and 28, a photographer in London and a playwright in New York with whom I am very close. I now live between Paris, Berlin and Maine, I travel a lot and, for me, the key to everything is to stay curious, open and understand that there are no answers. So when I heard during the campaign “Trump will fix it”, I thought to myself “Oh, my God, be careful!” (Laughs).

Can you also tell us a word about your plans for the future? ?

It will be a novel. Each time, I try to do something different. When I wrote “And This Is How We Will Live”, I told my editor: the action will take place in 2045, but don't worry, it won't be science fiction… The goal of my life is to avoid boredom. Boredom is tragic.

Douglas Kennedy's latest book: “Ailleurs chez moi” (Belfond, €22, 264 pages), highly recommended by the Midi Libre editorial team. I subscribe to read the rest