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  • The Devil in Babylon: Fear of Progress and the Birth of Modern Life
  • Allan Hepburn (bio)
Allan Levine. The Devil in Babylon: Fear of Progress and the Birth of Modern Life McClelland and Stewart. x, 436. $36.99

Clashes between conservative and liberal forces define the modern period, according to Allan Levine in The Devil in Babylon. The 'modern,' in this instance, refers roughly to the period between 1900 and 1935, although Levine occasionally reaches into the nineteenth century to provide background for the changes that characterize the early twentieth century. Modernity encompasses changes in technology, censorship, media, voting, alcohol consumption, and immigration. Levine tracks these phenomena chiefly in the United States, with related material concerning England and Canada. For example, the suffragettes' efforts to win the right to vote for women in England, especially efforts by Emmeline and Christabel Pankhurst, inspire and overlap with battles over civil rights for women conducted by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony in the United States, and Nellie McClung in Canada.

In its panoramic survey of people and events, The Devil in Babylon introduces modernism to a general reader or a high school student. Levine offers basic information rather than in-depth analysis of the period. Sections on Darwinism, Prohibition, the post–First World War Red Scare, censorship in Hollywood, eugenics, the Winnipeg General Strike, Emma Goldman, radio, the Chrysler building, contraception, and many other topics give this book the texture of a television documentary: fluid, edited, and general. Levine intersperses his historical narrative with cameo biographies of Fatty Arbuckle, Mae West, Al Capone, Samuel Bronfman, Margaret Sanger, Henry Ford, and numerous other epoch-defining people.

Several small inaccuracies occur. Oscar Wilde died in Paris, not London, as Levine reports. Nor was Lord Alfred Douglas at Wilde's side when he died. Sigmund Freud was born in Freiberg, in Moravia, not Vienna. Levine's etymology of 'flappers' – 'women whose slit-skirts fluttered in the wind' as they rode in cars – does not account for the nuances that the term packs, especially in 1920s usage.

Sometimes Levine's prose, in a bid for generality, simplifies history too much: 'White audiences adored the urban adventures of Amos 'n' Andy [on the radio], while black listeners were more circumspect.' What made black audiences more circumspect? What made white audiences adore the same program? Aimee Semple McPherson is called the 'most modern of evangelists,' although she might be modern because she bobs her hair and wears fashionable dresses, or because she uses the stage and radio to spread her message of faith, or because she remains true to her 'rural roots and traditional values.' Discussing Freud, Levine confusingly reports that 'soon his revolutionary theories about sexuality filtered down to the masses. But the process was gradual.' 'Soon' and 'gradual' offer conflicting characterizations of the same process. A multitude of historical vectors [End Page 514] slides beneath the word 'soon,' as when Levine states that 'Large-scale advertising campaigns soon became the norm, as ads on the radio and [in] newspapers competed for space and airtime.' How soon?

As the title of The Devil in Babylon intimates, modernism tussled with issues of faith. Levine sketches the animating force of prudish Christianity in the Women's Christian Temperance Movement, and the harnessing of technology to religion, as when evangelists take to the airwaves to broadcast their messages of salvation through Christ. Levine usefully points out that Nellie McClung's suffragism was tempered by her Christian beliefs, and that Henry Ford was actively and virulently anti-Semitic. He calls Will Hays, a devout Presbyterian, 'the figurative Puritan in Babylon' because of his appointed task of imposing moral codes on Hollywood films. Were this book intended for an academic reader, the argument about faith – with its attendant miseries of hatred, intolerance, and prejudice – might have had a sharper focus. Levine allows the crisis of faith, however, to be an intimation rather than an argument in this book. Meanwhile, the general reader picks up much useful information about trophies handed out to 'fitter families' by eugenics societies and Mae West's jail time.

Allan Hepburn

Allan Hepburn, Department of English, McGill University

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