That's the question the Guardian recently asked.
From the story...
Such a position is quite at odds with what I consider to be political fiction. When reading, say, 1984, The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists or Brave New World, it's the politics that provides the living pulse of the story. In each, social systems act upon the characters: they cannot escape their strictures. Each author uses these scenarios to vent their spleen, showing the glaring inequalities, subjugations and abuses of power that they provoke. In modern novels, however, politics seems more ephemeral, less pervasive – almost as if you can opt in or out.
While there are authors who take on political issues from a left-wing perspective – China Miéville, David Peace, James Kelman – political fiction is at its most dogmatic when approached from the right wing. Glenn Beck – a man so thrillingly cartoonish it's hard to believe he hasn't got a Scooby Doo-style tail hidden down his trousers – publishes The Overton Window next month, a novel he describes as "a story of America in a time much like today where the people are confused". It's modelled on Ayn Rand and is sure to be heralded as a masterpiece by his huge, devoted fanbase and decried by just about everyone else.
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