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Illustrated portrait of Karl Pascal

A character in It Can't Happen Here

Karl Pascal

Pascal is a communist imprisoned with Doremus at Trianon.

The book

Cover of It Can't Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis
It Can't Happen HereSinclair Lewis, 1935

An American dictatorship arrives through elections, promises, resentment, and a leader who insists only he can fix the country.

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Who they are in the book

Spoiler-free

Pascal is a communist imprisoned with Doremus at Trianon. The two become close despite ideological disagreement. Pascal grows increasingly rigid, while Doremus fears replacing one total system with another. His later fate is uncertain, but the friendship complicates the novel’s liberal view of resistance.

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