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Title: Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis ISBN: 0-553-21486-1 Publisher: Bantam Pub. Date: 01 September, 1998 Format: Mass Market Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $5.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.98 (42 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: The heart of Middle America
Comment: The action happens in a Midwest city called Zenith -your typical Cleveland, Cincinnatti or Minneapolis, during the 20's. The US are getting out of nation teenage and moving on to superpower status, which will come about after WWII. America is getting rich and the middle class which is its bakcbone is rapidly developing towards the crisis of the Great Depression and the further revival. Many guys are getting rich in the business-friendly country. George F. Babbitt is one of them, proud, ignorant and conformist. It is interstting to compare this novel to the ones by Scott Fitzgerald (the frivolity and wild life of the very rich) and to Steinbeck (the misery of the lowest clasees). Babbitt is the business man, the middle class self-made-man who really built what the US are today. The portrait, however, is not a celebration. Deep inside of him, Babbitt feels the hollowness, the vacuity of a life built around petty business success, a heartless social and family life, and the pretentiousness of his surroundings. At some point, Babbitt tries to rebel against society, but fails utterly, just as his friend Paul, a frustrated violinist turned roof-material salesman, who will end up in jail. It is the story of a man who tries to break up the mold of a rigid society, but is unable to do so for lack of will and spirit.
Although it is certainly unfair and absurd to think that all middle-class life is empty or unhappy, this is a powerful book in that it crudely depicts the dangers of conformity, of the "quiet desperation" of the life devoted solely to material success and social status, with no spiritual or intellectual life whatsoever. It should be read even more now, when American society is conforming to keeping the lowest common denominator in social life, and where mediocrity is rampant in the popular arts and entertainment.
Rating: 4
Summary: a novel of conformity
Comment: Sinclair Lewis is best known for his novel Main Street. But Babbitt is a fine novel. H.G. Wells said of it: "I wish I could have written Babbitt." It's a novel about George F. Babbitt and the city he lives in, Zenith. Some of the greatest lines in the book are descriptions of Zenith, not the least of which is the opening lines. Lewis creates in Babbitt the total conformist and we follow him through his conformity and into thinking on his own. Babbitt is simply a man who wants to be liked by everyone. Babbitt gives expression to the glibness and irresponsibility of the professional social climber. Lewis gives us one of our modern classics.
Rating: 5
Summary: shockingly modern
Comment: I was surprised to learn that what I think of as modern-day american culture existed in the 1920's. Girls sulk in sweatsuits. Couples divorce. Mid-life crises strike at 46. Teenage siblings argue over car keys. Unmuddied by old-timey-ness, the writing is clear and present from the first page.
Crochety old Babbitt (the title character) worships business, technology, and practical knowhow, but trembles daily with a vague dissatisfaction. A precursor to Revolutionary Road, Rabbit, Run, Independence Day, Preston Falls, and American Beauty, Babbit describes a middle-aged man undermined by his prosperity, teenage children, and his digestion.
Babbit burns away any nostalgia we might have of the '20s as part of an earlier time where faith staved off anxiety, civility reigned, or the world was any less immoral. Written during the period it describes, Babbitt reveals a basic american character and how little progress we have made
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Title: Main Street by Sinclair Lewis, Thomas Mallon ISBN: 0451526821 Publisher: Signet Pub. Date: June, 1998 List Price(USD): $5.95 |
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Title: The Jungle by Morris Dickstein, Upton Sinclair ISBN: 0553212451 Publisher: Bantam Pub. Date: 01 September, 1981 List Price(USD): $5.95 |
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Title: Elmer Gantry by Sinclair Lewis ISBN: 0451522516 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: February, 1978 List Price(USD): $7.95 |
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Title: The Grapes of Wrath: John Steinbeck Centennial Edition (1902-2002) by John Steinbeck ISBN: 0142000663 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: 03 January, 2002 List Price(USD): $15.00 |
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Title: Arrowsmith by Sinclair Lewis, E. L. Doctorow ISBN: 0451526910 Publisher: Signet Pub. Date: June, 1998 List Price(USD): $6.95 |
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