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Sinclair Lewis

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Sinclair Lewis
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sinclair Lewis (February 7 1885 – January 10 1951) was an American
novelist, short-story writer, and playwright. In 1930, he became the
first American to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, "for his
vigorous and graphic art of description and his ability to create, with
wit and humor, new types of characters." His works are known for their
insightful and critical views of American society and capitalist values,
as well as their strong characterizations of modern working women.
Biography
Boyhood and education
Born Harry Sinclair Lewis in the village of Sauk Centre, Minnesota, he
began reading books at a young age and kept a diary. He had two
siblings, Fred (born 1875) and Claude (born 1878). His father, Edwin J.
Lewis, was a physician and, at home, a stern disciplinarian who had
difficulty relating to his sensitive, unathletic third son. Lewis'
mother, Emma Kermott Lewis, died in 1891. The following year, Edwin
Lewis married Isabel Warner, whose company young Lewis apparently
enjoyed. Throughout his lonely boyhood, the ungainly Lewis — tall,
extremely thin, stricken with acne and somewhat popeyed — had trouble
gaining friends and pined after various local girls. At the age of 13,
he unsuccessfully ran away from home, wanting to become a drummer boy in
the Spanish-American War.
In late 1902, Lewis left home for a year at Oberlin Academy (the
then-preparatory department of Oberlin College) to qualify for
acceptance by Yale University. While at Oberlin, he developed a
religious enthusiasm that waxed and waned for much of his remaining
teenage years. He entered Yale in 1903 but did not receive his
bachelor's degree until 1908, having taken time off to work at Helicon
Home Colony, Upton Sinclair's cooperative-living colony in Englewood,
New Jersey, and to travel to Panama. Lewis's unprepossessing looks,
"fresh" country manners, and seemingly self-important loquacity did not
make it any easier for him to win and keep friends at Oberlin or Yale
than in Sauk Centre. Some of his crueler Yale classmates joked "that he
was the only man in New Haven who could fart out of his face".
Nevertheless, he did manage to initiate a few relatively long-lived
friendships among students and professors, some of whom recognized his
promise as a writer.
Early career
Lewis's earliest published creative work—romantic poetry and short
sketches—appeared in the Yale Courant and the Yale Literary Magazine, of
which he became an editor. After his graduation from Yale, Lewis moved
from job to job and from place to place in an effort to make ends meet,
write fiction for publication, and chase away boredom. While working for
newspapers and publishing houses (and for a time at the
Carmel-by-the-Sea, California writers' colony), he developed a facility
for turning out shallow, popular stories that were purchased by a
variety of magazines. At this time, he also earned money by selling
plots to Jack London, including the plot for London's unfinished novel
The Assassination Bureau, Ltd.
Lewis's first published book was Hike and the Aeroplane, a Tom
Swift-style potboiler that appeared in 1912 under the pseudonym Tom
Graham. In 1914 he married Grace Livingston Hegger, who was an editor at
Vogue magazine. His first serious novel, Our Mr. Wrenn: The Romantic
Adventures of a Gentle Man, appeared in 1914, followed by The Trail of
the Hawk: A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life (1915) and The Job (1917).
That same year also saw the publication of another potboiler, The
Innocents: A Story for Lovers, an expanded version of a serial story
that had originally appeared in Woman's Home Companion. Free Air,
another refurbished serial story, was published in 1919.
Commercial success
Upon moving to Washington, D.C., Lewis devoted himself to his writing.
As early as 1916, Lewis began taking notes for a realistic novel about
small-town life. Work on that novel continued through mid-1920, when he
completed Main Street which was published on October 23, 1920. As his
biographer Mark Schorer wrote, the phenomenal success of Main Street
"was the most sensational event in twentieth-century American publishing
history." Based on sales of his prior books, Lewis's most optimistic
projection was a sale of 25,000 copies. In the first six months of 1921
alone, Main Street sold 180,000 copies, and within a few years sales
were estimated at two million. According to Richard Lingeman "Main
Street earned Sinclair Lewis about three million current [2002]
dollars".
He followed up this first great success with Babbitt (1922), a novel
that satirized the American commercial culture and boosterism. The story
was set in the fictional Zenith, Winnemac, a setting Lewis would return
to in future novels, including Gideon Planish and Dodsworth.
Lewis' success in the 1920s continued with Arrowsmith (1925), a novel
about an idealistic doctor which was awarded the Pulitzer Prize (which
he refused). Elmer Gantry (1927), which depicted evangelicalism as
hypocritical, was denounced by religious leaders and was banned in some
U.S. cities. He divorced his first wife, Grace Hegger Lewis, in 1925,
and married Dorothy Thompson, a political newspaper columnist, on May
14, 1928. Together they had a son in 1930, actor Michael Lewis, but they
divorced in 1942. Lewis closed out the decade with Dodsworth (1929), a
novel about the most affluent and successful members of American society
leading essentially pointless lives in spite of their great wealth and
advantages.
Lewis also spent much of the late 1920s and 1930s writing short
stories for various magazines and publications. One of his short stories
published in Cosmopolitan magazine was "Little Bear Bongo" (1936), a
tale about a bear cub who wanted to escape the circus in search of a
better life in the real world.[6] The story was acquired by Walt Disney
Pictures in 1940 for a possible feature film. World War II sidetracked
those plans until 1947, when the story (now titled "Bongo") was placed
on a shorter length as a part of the Disney feature Fun and Fancy Free.
Nobel Prize
In 1930, Lewis won the Nobel Prize in Literature in his first year of
nomination. In the Swedish Academy's presentation speech, special
attention was paid to Babbitt. In his Nobel Lecture, he praised Theodore
Dreiser, Willa Cather, Ernest Hemingway, and other contemporaries, but
also lamented that "in America most of us — not readers alone, but even
writers — are still afraid of any literature which is not a
glorification of everything American, a glorification of our faults as
well as our virtues," and that America is "the most contradictory, the
most depressing, the most stirring, of any land in the world today."
Later years
After winning the Nobel Prize, Lewis published nine more novels in his
lifetime, the best remembered being It Can't Happen Here, a novel about
the election of a fascist U.S. President. He was married to Dorothy
Thompson until 1942, but the marriage effectively ended in 1937. Lewis
died in Rome on January 10, 1951, aged 65, from advanced alcoholism and
his cremated remains were buried in Sauk Centre. A final novel, World So
Wide, was published posthumously.
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BABBITT
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Type of work: Novel
Author: Sinclair Lewis (1885-1951)
Type of plot: Social satire
Time of plot: 1920s
Locale: Zenith, a fictional midwestern town
First published: 1922
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Babbitt is a pungent satire about a man who typifies complacent
mediocrity. Middle-class businessman George F. Babbitt revels in his
popularity, his automobile, and his ability to make money. He drinks
bootleg whiskey, bullies his wife, and ogles his manicurist. Because he
is firmly grounded in realism, Babbitt is one of American fiction's most
memorable characters; his very name has entered the language as a
synonym for the widespread phenomenon he represents.
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Principal Characters
George Г. Babbitt, a satirically portrayed prosperous real-estate dealer
in Zenith, a typical American city. He is the standardized product of
modern American civilization, a member of the Boosters' Club, hypnotized
by all the slogans of success, enthralled by material possessions,
envious of those who have more, patronizing toward those who have less,
yet dimly aware that his life is unsatisfactory. His high moment comes
when, after delivering a speech at a real-estate convention, he is asked
to take part in a political campaign against Seneca Doane, a liberal
lawyer who is running for mayor. As a result of his campaign efforts,
Babbitt is elected vice-president of the Boosters. His self-satisfaction
is shattered when his one real friend, Paul Riesling, shoots his nagging
wife and is sent to prison. For the first time Babbitt begins to doubt
the values of American middle-class life. He has a love affair with a
client, Mrs. Judique, and becomes involved with her somewhat bohemian
friends; he publicly questions some of the tenets of Boosterism; he
refuses to join the Good Citizens' League. But the pressure of public
opinion becomes too much for him; when his wife is taken ill, his brief
revolt collapses, and he returns to the standardized world of the
Boosters' Club.
Myra Babbitt, his colorless wife, whom he married because he could not
bear to hurt her feelings. She lives only for him and the children.
Verona Babbitt, their dumpy daughter. Just out of college, she is a
timid intellectual whose mild uncon-ventionality angers her father. He
is relieved when she marries Kenneth Escott.
Theodore (Ted) Babbitt, their son. A typical product of the American
school system, he hates study and the thought of college. He elopes with
Eunice Littlefield, thus winning his father's secret admiration, for he
has at least dared to do what he wanted.
Paul Riesling, Babbitt's most intimate friend since college days. With
the soul of a musician, he has been trapped into a lifetime of
manufacturing tar-roofing and is burdened with a shrewish wife. Goaded
to desperation, he shoots her and, though she lives, is sent to prison.
Zilla Riesling, Paul's nagging wife. With a vicious disposition that is
made worse by having too much time on her hands, she finally drives Paul
to the point of shooting her.
Mrs. Daniel (Tanis) Judique, a widow with whom Babbitt has a brief
affair as a part of his revolt against conventionality.
Seneca Doane, a liberal lawyer, the anathema of all the solid
businessmen of Zenith.
William Washington Eathorne, a rich conservative banker. He represents
the real power behind the scene in Zenith.
Charles and Lucille McKelvey, wealthy members of Zenith's smart set. The
Babbitts are hopeful of being accepted socially by the McKelveys but do
not succeed.
Ed and Mrs. Overbrook, a down-at-heels couple. They are hopeful of being
accepted socially by the Babbitts but do not succeed.
The Reverend Dr. John Jennison Drew, the efficient, high-powered pastor
of Babbitt's church.
Vergil Gunch, a successful coal dealer. He is prominent in all the civic
organizations to which Babbitt belongs.
T. Cholmondeley (Chum) Frink, a member of Babbitt's social group. He is
a popular poet whose work is syndicated throughout the country.
Howard Littlefield, Babbitt's next-door neighbor. An economist for the
Zenith Street Traction Company, he can prove to everyone's satisfaction
that Zenith is the best of all possible worlds.
Eunice Littlefield, his flapper daughter. She elopes with Ted Babbitt to
the public surprise and indignation of both families but to Babbitt's
secret delight.
Kenneth Escott, a newspaper reporter. After a tepid courtship, he
finally marries Verona Babbitt.
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The Story
George F. Babbitt was proud of his house in Floral Heights, one of the
most respectable residential districts in Zenith. Its architecture was
standardized; its interior decorations were standardized; its atmosphere
was standardized. Therein lay its appeal for Babbitt.
He bustled about in a tile and chromium bathroom during his morning
ritual of getting ready for another day. When he went down to breakfast,
he was as grumpy as usual. It was expected of him. He read the dull
real-estate page of the newspaper to his patient wife, Myra. Then he
commented on the weather, grumbled at his son and daughter, gulped his
breakfast, and started for his office.
Babbitt was a real-estate broker who knew how to handle business with
zip and zowie. Having closed a deal whereby he forced a poor businessman
to buy a piece of property at twice its value, he pocketed part of the
money and paid the rest to the man who had suggested the enterprise.
Proud of his acumen, he picked up the telephone and called his best
friend, Paul Riesling, to ask him to lunch.
Paul Riesling should have been a violinist, but he had gone into the
tar-roofing business in order to support his shrewish wife, Zilla.
Lately, she had made it her practice to infuriate doormen, theater
ushers, or taxicab drivers, and then ask Paul to come to her rescue and
fight them like a man. Cringing with embarrassment, Paul would pretend
he had not noticed the incident. Later, at home, Zilla would accuse him
of being a coward and a weakling.
So sad did Paul's affairs seem to Babbitt that he suggested a vacation
to Maine together—away from their wives. Paul was skeptical, but with
magnificent assurance, Babbitt promised to arrange the trip. Paul was
humbly grateful.
Back in his office, Babbitt refused a raise for one of his employees.
When he got home, he and his wife decided to give a dinner party, with
the arrangements taken from the contents of a woman's magazine, and
everything edible disguised to look like something else.
The party was a great success. Babbitt's friends were exactly like
Babbitt. They all became drunk on prohibition gin, were disappointed
when the cocktails ran out, stuffed themselves with food, and went home
to nurse headaches.
Sometime later, Babbitt and Myra paid a call on the Rieslings. Zilla,
trying to enlist their sympathy, berated her husband until he was goaded
to fury. Babbitt finally told Zilla that she was a nagging, jealous,
sour, and unwholesome wife, and he demanded that she allow Paul to go
with him to Maine. Weeping in self-pity, Zilla consented. Myra sat
calmly during the scene, but later she criticized Babbitt for bullying
Paul's wife. Babbitt told her sharply to mind her own business.
On the train, Babbitt and Paul met numerous businessmen who loudly
agreed with one another that what this country needed was a sound
business administration. They deplored the price of motor cars,
textiles, wheat, and oil; they swore that they had not an ounce of race
prejudice; they blamed communism and socialism for labor unions that got
out of hand. Paul soon tired of the discussion and went to bed. Babbitt
stayed up late, smoking countless cigars and telling countless stories.
Maine had a soothing effect upon Babbitt. He and Paul fished and hiked
in the quiet of the north woods, and Babbitt began to realize that his
life in Zenith was not all it should be. He promised himself a new
outlook on life, a more simple, less hurried way of living.
Back in Zenith, Babbitt was asked to make a speech at a convention of
real-estate men, which was to be held in Monarch, a nearby city. He
wrote a speech contending that real-estate men should be considered
professionals and called realtors. At the meeting, he declaimed loudly
that real estate was a great profession, that Zenith was God's own
country—the best little spot on earth—and to prove his statements, he
quoted countless statistics on waterways, textile production, and lumber
manufacture. The speech was such a success that Babbitt instantly won
recognition as an orator.
Babbitt was made a precinct leader in the coming election. His duty was
to speak to small labor groups about the inadvisability of voting for
Seneca Doane, a liberal, in favor of a man named Prout, a solid
businessman who represented the conservative element. Babbitt's speeches
helped to defeat Doane. He was very proud of himself for having Vision
and Ideals.
On a business trip to Chicago, Babbitt spied Paul Riesling sitting at
dinner with a middle-aged and pretty woman. Later, in his hotel room,
Babbitt indignantly demanded an explanation for Paul's lack of morality.
Paul told Babbitt that he could no longer stand living with Zilla.
Babbitt, feeling sorry for his friend, swore that he would keep Paul's
secret from Zilla. Privately, Babbitt envied Paul's independence.
Babbitt was made vice-president of the Booster's Club. He was so proud
of himself that he bragged loudly when his wife called him at the
office. It was a long time before he understood what she was trying to
tell him; Paul had shot his wife.
Babbitt's world collapsed about him. Though Zilla was still alive, Paul
was in prison. Babbitt began to question his ideas about the power of
the dollar. Paul was perhaps the only person Babbitt had ever loved.
Myra had long since become a habit, and the children were too full of
new ideas to be close to their father. Babbitt felt suddenly alone. He
began to criticize the minister's sermons. He no longer visited the
Athletic Club and rarely ate lunch with any of his business
acquaintances.
One day, the pretty widow Mrs. Judique came to his office and asked him
to find her a flat. Babbitt joined her circle of Bohemian friends. He
drank more than he had ever drunk in his life. He spent money wildly.
Two of the most powerful men in town requested that he join the Good
Citizen's League—or else. Babbitt refused to be bullied. For the first
time in his life, he was a human being. He actually made friends with
his archenemy, Seneca Doane, and discovered that he liked his liberal
ideas. He praised Doane publicly. Babbitt's new outlook on life appealed
to his children, who at once began to respect him as they never had
before. Babbitt, however, became unpopular among his business-boosting
friends. When he again refused to join the Good Citizen's League, he was
snubbed in the streets. Gradually, Babbitt found that he had no real
resources within himself. He was miserable.
When Myra became ill, Babbitt suddenly realized that he loved his
colorless wife. He broke with Mrs. Judique and joined the Good Citizen's
League. By the time Myra was well again, there was no more active leader
in the town of Zenith than George F. Babbitt. Once more he announced his
distrust of Seneca Doane. He became the best Booster the club ever had.
His last gesture of revolt was private approval of his son's elopement.
Outwardly he conformed.
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Critical Evaluation
Zenith, "the Zip City—Zeal, Zest, and Zowie," is Sinclair Lewis'
satirical composite picture of the typical progressive American
"business city" of the 1920s, and middle-aged, middle-class midwesterner
George F. Babbitt is its average prosperous citizen. Everything about
Zenith is modern. A few old buildings, ramshackle witnesses of the
city's nineteenth century origins, are embarrassing, discordant notes
amid the harmony of newness produced by shining skyscrapers, factories,
and railroads. One by one, the old buildings are surrounded and
bulldozed. The thrust of all energies in the city is toward growth: One
of Zenith's most booming businesses is real estate; one of its favorite
occupations is the religious tallying and charting of population
increase.
As Lewis presents his characters, however, the reader discovers that the
prosperity and growth of Zenith has been inversely proportional to the
intellectual bankruptcy and spiritual stagnation of its inhabitants.
Because they subscribe to the values of Zenith's culture, which are all
based on the "Dollar Ethic," Lewis' characters think in terms of
production and consumption, judge people on the grounds of their
purchasing power, and seek happiness in the earning and spending of
money. This creed of prosperity permeates every aspect of society. It is
evident not only in political and economic beliefs (discussion between
Babbitt and his friends about government affairs is limited to the
monotonous refrain, "What this country needs is a good, sound business
administration") but in moral and religious attitudes as well. Thus, Dr.
Drew attracts followers to his "Salvation and Five Percent" church with
a combined cross-and-dollar-sign approach. Even more sinister is the
facility with which the upright Babbitt carries through crooked deals in
his real estate business. In one maneuver, he plots with a speculator to
force a struggling grocer to buy the store building (which he has been
renting for years) at a scalper's price. The money ethic is so elemental
to Babbitt's conscience that he honestly feels nothing but delight and
pride when the deal is completed; his only regret is that the speculator
carries off nine thousand dollars while Babbitt receives a mere four
hundred and fifty dollar commission. At the same time, Babbitt—with no
inkling of his hypocrisy—discourses on his virtue to his friend Paul
Riesling, touting his own integrity while denigrating the morality of
his competitors.
The value placed on money also determines Zenith's aesthetic standards.
There is no frivolity about the city's architecture; the most important
structures are the strictly functional business buildings. Other
structures, such as the Athletic Club—where the businessmen go to
"relax" and discuss weighty matters of finance—are gaudy, unabashed
copies of past styles; the Club's motley conglomeration includes
everything from Roman to Gothic to Chinese. The culmination of literary
talent in Zenith is the work of Chum Frink, whose daily newspaper lyrics
are indistinguishable from his Zeeco car ads. He comes to Babbitt's
dinner party fresh from having written a lyric in praise of drinking
water instead of poison booze; with bootleg cocktail in hand, he
identifies the American genius as the fellow who can run a successful
business or the man who writes the Prince Albert Tobacco ads.
Most important, the prosperity ethic is at the heart of social norms in
Zenith; it is the basis upon which each citizen judges his individual
worth. Lewis' novel includes caricatures of men in every major field of
endeavor: Howard Littlefield is the scholar; T. Cholmondeley Frink, the
poet; Mike Monday, the popular preacher; Jake Offut, the politician;
Vergil Gunch, the industrialist. Yet despite their various professions,
these men are identical in their values; they are united in their
complacent pride at their own success and in their scorn for those who
have not "made it." A man is measured by his income and his possessions.
Thus, Babbitt's car is far more than his means of transportation, and
his acquisition of gimmicks like the nickel-plated cigar cutter more
than mere whim; both car and cigar cutter are affirmations of competence
and virility. But the more Babbitt and his peers strive to distinguish
themselves through ownership, the more alike they seem. Thus, the men of
Zenith, since they are saturated day after day with the demands of the
business life and its values, are even more alike than the women, who
are not as immersed in the "rat race" as their husbands.
Mercilessly revealing and minutely detailed as its portrait of Zenith
is, however, Babbitt would not be the excellent novel it is if Lewis had
stopped at that. In addition to being an expose of shallowness, the
novel is the chronicle of one man's feeble and half-conscious attempt to
break out of a meaningless and sterile existence. In the first half of
the book, George Babbitt is the Zenithite par excellence; but in the
realtor's sporadic bursts of discontent, Lewis plants seeds of the
rebellion to come. Babbitt's complacency is occasionally punctured by
disturbing questions: Might his wife be right that he bullied Zilla only
to strut and show off his strength and virtue? Are his friends really
interesting people? Does he really love his wife and enjoy his career?
These nagging questions and the pressures in his life finally build
sufficient tension to push Babbitt to the unprecedented step of taking a
week's vacation in Maine without his wife and children. The trip
relieves his tension and dissolves the questions, and he returns to
another year in Zenith with renewed vigor and enthusiasm for Boosters,
baseball, dinner parties, and real estate.
It takes the personal tragedy of his friend Paul Riesling to really
shock Babbitt out of this routine way of life; Paul's snooting of his
wife and consequent imprisonment,
which occur approximately midway in the novel, shake Babbitt to his
foundations. The Babbitt of the first half of the story is a parody; the
Babbitt of the second half, a weak and struggling human being. After
Paul goes to prison, Babbitt seems to throw off his previous life-style:
he drinks, smokes, and curses; he frequents wild parties, befriends the
city's bohemian set, adopts radical opinions, and has a love affair. All
these things are part of his rebellion against stifling circumstances
and his attempt to escape into individuality. The attempt fails because
he lacks the inner strength to be independent, and his revolt is
ultimately little more than a teapot tempest. Whether preaching the
philosophy of the Elks or rebelliously praising the radical politics of
Seneca Doane, whether giving a dinner party with his wife or sneaking
out to see Mrs. Judique, Babbitt never truly acts on his own.
Thus, by the end of the novel, Babbitt has returned to the fold, joining
the Good Citizen's League and redoubling his zeal in behalf of Zenith
Booster activities. But even though Babbitt lacks the strength to break
out of his mold, Lewis does not imply that he is unchanged by his
experience. On the contrary, Babbitt rediscovers his love for his wife
and learns something about himself. By the close of the novel he has
grown in awareness, even if he has proven himself incapable of
essentially changing his life. If he has lost his own individuality, he
is still able to hope for better things for his son, Ted, of whose
elopement he secretly approves.
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MAIN STREET
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Type of work: Novel
Author: Sinclair Lewis
Type of plot: Social satire
Time of plot: с 1910-1920
Locale: Small midwestern town
First published: 1920
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In this portrait of a typical small midwestern town called Gopher
Prairie, Lewis satirizes the smug complacency, narrow-mindedness,
hypocrisy, and resistance to change of the small-town mentality. Despite
its social criticism, however, Main Street reflects Lewis' affection for
his home town ofSauk Center, Minnesota, upon which Gopher Prairie was
based.
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Principal Characters
Carol Kennicott, an idealistic girl eager to reform the world.
Interested in sociology and civic improvement, she longs to transform
the ugliness of midwestern America into something more beautiful. Having
married Dr. Will Kennicott, she moves to his home in Gopher Prairie,
Minnesota, a hideous small town indistinguishable from hundreds of
similar communities. There she shocks and angers the townspeople by her
criticisms and by her attempts to combat the local smugness. To its
citizens Gopher Prairie is perfection; they can see no need for change.
To her, it is an ugly, gossipy, narrow-minded village, sunk in dullness
and self-satisfaction. Her efforts to change the town fail, and she
drifts into a mild flirtation with Erik Valborg, a Swedish tailor with
artistic yearnings. Frightened by the village gossip, she and Kennicott
take a trip to California; but on her return she realizes that she must
get away from both her husband and Gopher Prairie. After some argument,
she and her small son leave for Washington, where she stays for more
than a year. The flight is a failure, for she finds Washington only an
agglomeration of the small towns of America. She returns to Gopher
Prairie, realizing that it is her home. Her crusade has failed; she can
only hope that her children will accomplish what she has been unable to
do.
Dr. Will Kennicott, Carol's husband, a successful physician in Gopher
Prairie. Though he loves Carol, he is dull and unimaginative, unable to
enter her world or to understand her longings. He is the typical
self-satisfied citizen of a small town.
Guy Pollock, a lawyer. Though sensitive and intellectual, he is the
victim of the "village virus" that has deprived him of all initiative.
At first he appears to Carol as the most hopeful person in town, but he
disappoints her with his timidity and conventionalism.
Vida Sherwin, a teacher in the high school. Though better educated, she
is as satisfied with the Gopher Prairie standards as are the other
citizens. She marries Raymond Wutherspoon.
Raymond Wutherspoon, a sales clerk in the Bon Ton Store. A pallid, silly
man, he marries Vida Sherwin. He goes to France during World War I and
returns as a major.
Erik Valborg, a tailor in Gopher Prairie, the son of a Swedish farmer.
Handsome and esthetically inclined, he attracts Carol, and they have a
mild flirtation. But gossip drives him from the town; he goes to
Minneapolis and is last seen playing small parts in the movies.
Bea Sorenson, a farm girl who comes to Gopher Prairie to find work. She
is as much fascinated by the town as Carol is repelled. She becomes the
Kennicotts' hired girl and Carol's only real friend. She marries Miles
Bjornstam and has a son. She and the little boy both die of typhoid
fever.
Miles Bjornstam, the village handy man and radical, one of the few
genuine people in Gopher Prairie and one of the few who understand
Carol. He marries Bea Sorenson; when she and their child die, he leaves
the town.
Mrs. Bogart, the Kennicotts' neighbor. She is the epitome of village
narrow-mindedness.
Sam Clark, a hardware dealer and solid citizen.
Percy Bresnahan, born in Gopher Prairie but now a successful automobile
manufacturer in Boston. He visits his home for occasional fishing trips
and stoutly maintains that it is God's country. Heavy-handed, jocular,
and thoroughly standardized, he is the forerunner of George F. Babbitt.
James Blauser, known as "Honest Jim." A professional hustler and a
promoter, he is hired to start a campaign for a Greater Gopher Prairie.
Not much is accomplished.
Hugh, Will and Carol's first child, on whom she lavishes her attention.
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The Story
When Carol Milford was graduated from Blodgett College in Minnesota, she
determined to conquer the world. Interested in sociology, and village
improvement in particular, she often longed to set out on a crusade of
her own to transform dingy prairie towns to thriving, beautiful
communities. When she met Will Kennicott, a doctor from Gopher Prairie,
and listened to his praise of his hometown, she agreed to marry him. He
had convinced her that Gopher Prairie needed her.
Carol was essentially an idealist. On the train, going to her new home,
she deplored the rundown condition of the countryside and wondered about
the future of the northern Middle West. Will did not listen to her ideas
sympathetically. The people were happy, he said. Through town after town
they traveled, Carol noting with sinking heart the shapeless mass of
hideous buildings, the dirty depots, the flat wastes of prairie
surrounding everything, and she knew that Gopher Prairie would be no
different from the rest.
Gopher Prairie was exactly like the other towns Carol had seen, except
that it was a little larger. The people were as drab as their houses and
as flat as their fields. A welcoming committee met the newly weds at the
train. To Carol, all the men were alike in their colorless clothes;
overfriendly, overenthusiastic. The Kennicott house was a Victorian
horror, but Will said he liked it.
Introduced to the townsfolk at a party held in her honor, Carol heard
the men talk of motorcars, train schedules, "furriners," and praise
Gopher Prairie as God's own country. The women were interested in
gossip, sewing, and cooking, and most of them belonged to the two
women's clubs, the Jolly Seventeen and the Thanatopsis Club. At the
first meeting of the Jolly Seventeen, Carol incurred the member's
resentment when she stated that the duty of a librarian was to get
people to read. The town librarian staunchly asserted that her primary
trust was to preserve the books.
Carol did many things which were to cause her great unhappiness. She
hired a maid and paid her the over-generous sum of six dollars a week.
She gave a party with an Oriental motif. Sometimes she even kicked off a
slipper under the table and revealed her arches. The women frowned on
her unconventional behavior. Worse, she redecorated the old Kennicott
house and got rid of the mildew, the ancient bric-a-brac, and the dark
wallpaper. Will protested against her desire to change things.
Carol also joined the Thanatopsis Club, for she hoped to use the club as
a means of awakening interest in social reform. The women of Gopher
Prairie, however, while professing charitable intentions, had no idea of
improving social conditions. When Carol mentioned that something should
be done about the poor people of the town, everyone firmly stated that
there was no real poverty in Gopher Prairie. Carol also attempted to
raise funds for a new city hall, but no one could see that the ugly old
building needed to be replaced. The town voted against appropriating the
necessary funds.
Will Kennicott bought a summer cottage on Lake Minniemashie. There Carol
enjoyed outdoor life and during the summer months almost lost her desire
for reform. When September came, however, she hated the thought of
returning to Gopher Prairie.
Carol resolved to study her husband. He was well thought of in the town,
and she romanticized herself as the wife of a hardworking, courageous
country doctor. She fell in love with Will again on the night she
watched him perform a bloody but successful operation upon a poor
farmer. Carol's praise of her husband, however, had little effect. Will
was not the romantic figure she had pictured. He accepted his duties as
a necessary chore, and the thought that he had saved the life of a human
being did not occur to him. His interest in medicine was identical with
his interest in motorcars. Once more, Carol turned her attention to
Gopher Prairie.
Carol, trying to interest the Thanatopsis Club in literature and art,
finally persuaded the members to put on an amateur theatrical, but
enthusiasm soon waned. Carol's choice of a play, Shaw's Androcles, was
vetoed, and The Girl from Kankakee put in its place. Carol considered
even that choice too subtle for Gopher Prairie, but at least the town's
interest in the theater had been revived.
After three years of marriage, Carol discovered that she was pregnant.
Almost immediately, the neighborhood became interested in her condition.
When her son was born, she resolved that some day she would send little
Hugh away from Gopher Prairie, to Harvard, Yale, or Oxford.
With a new son and the new status of motherhood, Carol found herself
more a part of the town, but she devoted nine-tenths of her attention to
Hugh and had little time to criticize the town. She wanted a new house,
but she and Will could not agree on the type of building. He was
satisfied with a square frame house. Carol had visions of a Georgian
mansion, with stately columns and wide lawns, or a white cottage like
those at Cape Cod.
Then Carol met a tailor in town, an artistic, twenty-five-year-old
aesthete with whom she imagined herself in love. She often dropped by
his shop to see him, and one day Will warned her that the gossip in town
was growing. Ashamed, Carol promised she would not see him again. The
tailor left for Minneapolis.
Carol and Will decided to take a trip to California. When they returned
three months later, Carol realized that her attempt to escape Gopher
Prairie had been unsuccessful. For one thing, Will had gone with her.
What she needed now was to get away from her husband. After a long
argument with Will, Carol took little Hugh and went off to Washington,
where she planned to do war work.
Yet hers was an empty kind of freedom. She found the people in
Washington an accumulation of the population of thousands of Gopher
Prairies all over the nation. Main Street had merely been transplanted
to the larger city. Disheartened by her discovery, Carol had too much
pride to return home.
After thirteen months, Will went to get her. He missed her terribly, he
said, and begged her to come back. Hugh was overjoyed to see his father,
and Carol realized that inevitably she would have to return to Gopher
Prairie.
Home once more, Carol found that her furious hatred for Gopher Prairie
had burned itself out. She made friends with the clubwomen and promised
herself not to be snobbish in the future. She would go on asking
questions— she could never stop herself from doing that—but her
questions now would be asked with sympathy rather than with sarcasm. For
the first time, she felt serene. In Gopher Prairie, she felt at last
that she was wanted. Her neighbors had missed her. For the first time,
Carol felt that Gopher Prairie was her home.
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Critical Evaluation
Sinclair Lewis frequently had difficulty in determining in his own mind
whether his works were meant as bitterly comic satires of American life
and values or whether they were planned as complex novels centering
around the lives of the series of characters he made famous. One of the
difficulties of reading Lewis is that these two conflicting sorts of
writing are both present in many of his works, and frequently at odds
with each other. This is demonstrably true of Main Street, which cannot
simply be called a satire of life in small-town America. For all the
satire of small-town attitudes and values, Lewis is not unequivocal in
his attack as a satirist might be expected to be. Actually, he finds
quite a lot of value in the best Main Street has to offer, and he seems
to see Carol Kennicott's reconciliation with Gopher Prairie at the end
of the novel as a triumph more than a failure on her part. Thus, though
Main Street is, as it has been frequently called, a revolt against the
village, it is a revolt marked by the complexity of Lewis' attitude
toward Gopher Prairie and toward its real-life counterpart, Sauk Center,
Minnesota, where Lewis spent his early years.
Lewis' characters, particularly Will and Carol Kennicott, are another
complication in this novel which prevents it from being simply a satire.
Unlike the one-dimensional characters typical of satire, the Kennicotts
develop into somewhat rounded characters who demand attention and
sympathy in their own rights. Carol in particular, as the central figure
of the novel, is developed more novelistically than satirically as Lewis
traces her development from a very naive and foolishly idealistic young
woman into a more tolerant and understanding human being. Ironically,
for the reader to adopt only the critical and satiric portrait of the
small town that lies at the surface of Main Street would be for him to
embrace the same overly simplistic attitudes that characterized Carol at
the beginning of the novel, and which she must escape as evidence of her
maturity.
During the early part of the century, Americans tended to accept on
faith the premise that all that was best in life was epitomized by the
small-town environment. Though by no means the first author to attack
this premise, Lewis with Main Street achieved the widespread popularity
which gave new prominence to this revolt against the small town. Lewis,
himself a small-town boy, knew at first hand the discrepancy between the
vision of the village as a Utopia and the actuality of its bleak
cultural and moral atmosphere. As Lewis makes clear in his prologue,
Main Street is an analogue for all such towns, and by his treatment of
Gopher Prairie, Lewis sought to strike a satiric blow at the very
heartland of America. Rather than a Utopia, Lewis discovers in the
provincial mentality of the small town a surfeit of hypocrisy, bigotry,
ignorance, cruelty, and, perhaps most damning of all, a crippling
dullness and conformity which is essentially hostile to any possibility
of intellectual or emotional life. Ironically, though, even while
ruthlessly exposing these negative qualities of the small town, Lewis
finds, particularly in the matter-of-fact courage and determination of
Will Kennicott, some of the very qualities which have given the small
town its reputation as the strength of America. The fact is, Lewis was
himself ambivalent in his attitude toward the village, and this
indecisiveness creeps into the novel to mitigate his castigation of
middle America.
The action of the novel centers around Carol Kennicott 's discovery of
the nature of life and society in Gopher Prairie and culminates with her
eventual compromise with the town. For Lewis' purposes, Carol is an
excellent device that enables him to expose the bleak heart of the
midwestern town by contrasting its qualities and values with her own.
Young, educated, intelligent, and idealistic, Carol can bring vision to
Gopher Prairie. In that role she performs well. It is when she performs
as a character in her own right that readers begin to see that Lewis'
attitude is more complicated than simply approving Carol's values
against those of the town. Carol's idealism is accompanied by a naivete
and intolerance which prevents her from accomplishing the reforms she
advocates because she can only hope to change Gopher Prairie by becoming
part of it. The polarization she brings about by trying too much too
soon makes it improbable that she should ever be able to realize her
ambitions for the town unless she learns to accommodate to—though not
necessarily to approve of—its values. After running away to Washington
only to discover that the values of the city are not too different from
those of the village, Carol is in a better position to adopt a more
tolerant attitude toward the villagers. As readers see her at the end of
the novel, she has made an effort to come to terms with her environment
by working to evolve realistic reforms rather than seeking a radical
overthrow of entrenched values and institutions. In losing her naivete,
Carol gains in terms of her ability to confront reality and even to
change it over a period of time.
Actually, most of Carol's reforms are too superficial to cure what Lewis
called the village virus. Her concern is more with manners than values,
and she would only substitute the slick sophistication of the city for
the provincial dullness she finds so intolerable. The perfect foil to
her is Will Kennicott, who, while epitomizing all the worst of the
town's boorishness, goes about his daily medical practice with a quiet
efficiency, determination, and even courage that Lewis clearly admires.
Will's presence makes it impossible simply to accept Carol's assessment
of the vulgarity of the town as Lewis' final word. It is Gopher Prairie
that finally triumphs as Carol reconciles herself to its full reality.
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