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 Nightmare on Main Street February 13, 2010
Franklin the Mouse (Gorham, ME USA)
Ninety years later and Mr. Lewis' classic is still very applicable to present day society. I grew up in a small town and felt the author gave a very accurate, albeit caustic, depiction of its conservative provincialism and insecurities. Clearly, there is no love lost between Mr. Lewis and small-town America. My hatred of the incessant gossiping and pressure to confirm to a town's norms unexpectedly came percolating to the surface while reading this book. It isn't very often that I've ever lost sleep over a work of fiction, but this baby did the trick. Characters with even a modicum of individuality continually run the gauntlet of behind-the-back ridicule and fake cordiality. For me, this sharp satire cut right to the bone. By the time I finished this 500-plus-page book, I had more than my fill of arrogant, childish Carol Kennicott as well as the town's busybodies, poseurs and hypocrites. It's a great book, but a very uncomfortable read. It was a mistake to read it during the gloomiest month of the year.
An American Classic for Several Reasons November 29, 2009
Bill R. Moore (New York, USA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
The book that made Sinclair Lewis famous, this was the first in a remarkable series of 1920s novels that earned him a lasting name and ensured him a spot in the American canon, though several taste revolutions ensure we now see it very differently. To understand Main Street's immediate titanic impact it is necessary to recall when it was written and published. It came out in 1920, between World War I and the Great Depression. The universal sourness left by the former still lingered, and the economic boom leading up to the latter's massive bust had not really begun. America was cautiously optimistic but knew major changes were needed and that many had already come - for better or worse. Main Street reflects two changes that had become undeniable: the twilight of American village dominance and the expanding role of women. The pioneer days that led to small settlements like Lewis' actual hometown of Sauk Centre, Minnesota and Main Street's fictional Gophers Prairie, Minnesota were already all but gone by the time of Lewis' 1885 birth. Growing up, his generation saw its dying gasps. By 1920, cities had emerged as the indisputable center of American progress in all forms: political, social, artistic, intellectual. The death of small towns was proclaimed - gladly by most; regretfully, if sentimentally, by some. On the other hand, the Progressive Movement in many ways culminated in 1919, when women were given the right to vote. This, coupled with the greater independence and connection with the world outside the home forced on them by WWI, ensured they were an ever-growing force.
Main Street synthesizes these elements into brilliant, mostly satirical but thoroughly realistic fiction. Carol, its protagonist, is a prime example of the (then-) New Woman: educated, independent, willful, and ambitious. Its main setting is the sort of American small town that then seemed to be undeniably dying. The inevitable conflict between the two and all associated controversies - conservatism vs. liberalism in politics, mores, gender roles, etc. - is vividly dramatized. We see many contemporary sociopolitical issues played out movingly and instructively. The book is extraordinary in making many of the same points Betty Friedan later famously made in The Feminine Mystique - all the more extraordinary in being decades earlier and written by a man. It is thus unsurprisingly a classic of feminist literature. Like many twentieth-century American women, Carol left college with a passionate desire to reform the world but little idea how to do it. After several years of dreaming but little practical result, she decides to marry and ostensibly "settle down" after all but cannot bring herself to abandon her dreams. Yes, her husband will be the breadwinner, and she will run the house while taking care of the inevitable children, but she does not despair; she will reform the small town to which she moves. Sadly, again like many real-life women before and even today, she finds that her vague dreams are no match for Society and Custom. She fights against them for years in varying ways with small successes here and there but never gets beyond tolerable equilibrium. Several times she threatens to run away or take some other radical step and eventually does - only to return, somewhat begrudgingly but not without hope. Lewis beguilingly leaves the ending somewhat open. Carol is neither glad nor sorry to have returned and settles back into routine easily enough, realizing she will never achieve her aspirations but resolving to keep trying. She has gained a new practicality and may get somewhat further. She even has newfound appreciation for Small Town America and its ways in certain respects and is essentially cured of naïve notions that she had developed more from imagined contrast with her drab existence than from experience or reality. However, we are left in little doubt that she will be more or less a failure, arguably not even a grand one. She will live out her life just like nearly all women for all practical purposes, dying as if she had never lived - ideals broken, goals unfulfilled. The book ends somewhat abruptly with her practical, down-to-earth, traditional husband ignoring her last-ditch rationalization to talk of the eternally mundane - a dread foreboding of her life to come. It is a pretty bleak depiction of the New Woman's future - certainly depressing for anyone then interested in it to complicate.
But there is far more to Main Street, and it is not nearly as dark in tone as I have implied. Indeed, like Lewis' other famous works, it is generally satirical - often bitingly but at least as often humorously. He was a diverse author who can be appreciated in many ways, not least in his dramatically vivid depictions of the small town Upper Midwest in the early twentieth century. This puts him solidly in the grand tradition of American local color writers. His brilliant ear for dialogue is one of his greatest strengths here, but his thoroughly realistic style also shines; as fellow small town Minnesotan Bob Dylan puts it in Chronicles Volume One, Lewis was "the master of absolute realism, had invented it." He has a near-unmatched eye for little details and is one of the most visual of writers. His depictions of small town life - from store front descriptions to almost Dickensian deftness with character traits and quirks - truly make his settings come alive. Even a well-done film could hardly convey them more palpably. From early on, some derided Lewis' descriptions as too inclusive to be artistic, and they probably are something one either loves or hates. However, they are certainly an important part of his style and a cornerstone of his realism. The same goes for his generally episodic writing. Yet his style is not, as one might easily assume, boring or stilted. This is where satire serves him best. There is something to grin at on nearly every page and often something to laugh aloud at; the send-up of Small Town America's failings, foibles, conceits, and pretensions is caustic and enduring. He criticizes where appropriate and is often merciless even when most amusing. Many well-known small town faults - hypocritical piety, arrogance under the guise of humility, jealousy of cities under veil of complacency, etc. - are shown with stunning skill, and it is no exaggeration to say the contempt most Americans now at least claim to have for small towns stems in large part from Main Street, whether or not they know it. That said, it is easy to exaggerate this aspect of the novel and of Lewis generally, as he is above all notably realistic. Lewis unforgettably shows that small towns are more than just laughs, even satiric ones. Tragedy creeps dreadfully in more than once; several subplots involving minor characters are especially heart-wrenching. His satire also turns to wider arenas; indeed, another way to appreciate Lewis is through his examination of contemporary issues. One can almost see his novels as satirical American versions of Henrik Ibsen's famous "problem plays." The religious satire that would come to fruition in Elmer Gantry is especially prominent here. It is instructive to see how much this issue has changed, though still prominent; how incredible to realize that Sunday driving and recreation were actually controversial in 1920! Perhaps more importantly, if more inclined to satire than charity, he nonetheless convincingly shows small towns' few positive aspects and has much to say of pros and cons relative to cities. Some of Main Street's characters are so viciously lampooned that those inclined to defend may call them unfairly one-sided, though others have virtuous qualities depicted, sometimes even in regard to city-dwellers. One can easily retort that the fault lies not in Lewis but in the upstart yokels he drew from, but his take on them is in any case leavened by playful pokes at Carol and others who think themselves so superior to Gopher Prairie and its ilk. They may well be right but are surely not as right as they think - and Lewis will not let them or anyone else forget.
The depiction of Carol is indeed one of the more interesting facets. She was a radical, even revolutionary, character at the time and still stands out as a strong, thoroughly modern heroine; she would have been unthinkable in a mainstream work even a few decades prior. Yet she is far from idealized; even the most sympathetic feminists cannot deny some of her less appealing qualities, such as vanity, materialism, and bouts of classism. Indeed, those so inclined could even somewhat plausibly argue that she is satirized just as much as other characters. For all her high-mindedness and talk, she is a hopeless idealist: flighty, watery, and near-comically impractical. She changes her mind within minutes on the most important topics for the slightest pretexts - and goes back just as quickly. The years have only underlined these faults; she can now easily seem naïve, even silly, for the same reasons she struck initial readers as vibrant and full of potential. That said, it cannot be seriously doubted that Lewis meant her to be sympathetic and, to a certain degree, proscriptive. Her faults, such as they are, essentially serve to make her well-rounded; above all, she is believable. She is not meant to be perfect so much as Everywoman - or what Lewis thought Everywoman could or would be. Besides, she has several inarguably admirable qualities, including determination and stamina. She still stands as one of American literature's - nay, literature's - strongest and most distinctive female leads.
As all this implies, though not really written as such, Main Street can easily be seen as a historical novel. To be sure, it is a fascinating glimpse into an important, distinct American era in nearly all sociopolitical aspects. It also of course gives much insight into early twentieth century American Small Town Life and women's issues. Some would perhaps call it dated for these reasons, but there is a strange sense in which it is at least as relevant as ever. The edition I read was from the early 1960s with an Afterword by Lewis biographer/critic Mark Schorer that says contemporary readers see the novel far differently than initial ones because, among other things, Small Town America's fate had been sociologically decided - i.e., was virtually gone and soon would be for good. Yet it remains nearly fifty years later. Nearly all Americans are at least outwardly contemptuous of small towns, and most are probably genuine, but there is also a wide-ranging sentimental streak keeping them alive. Perhaps more importantly, their actual inhabitants, though shrinking each year, are largely unchanged - at least as self-righteous and complacent as Lewis depicted nearly a century ago. I grew up in one even smaller than Gopher Prairie in the 1990s, and it is still virtually the same - proudly ignorant, xenophobic, fiercely resistant to change, etc. -, as are its thousands of nationwide counterparts. Indeed, hard as it is to believe, they have actually in some ways even worsened; I cannot begin to imagine the residents of mine even having heard of the intellectual and literary people and concepts Carol is dismayed at Gopher Prairie consciously turning down. Small towns thus continue to cancerously cling to the main American movement of growth and progress and show no real sign of disappearing any time soon. Main Street will continue to have special relevance as long as they exist.
However, this is a small part of its legacy. It will surely continue to be read as long as great literature is appreciated because, important as its time-specific elements are, its core themes are timeless: individuality vs. collectivity, idealism vs. practicality, knowledge vs. ignorance, etc. Lewis wrote powerfully about these issues in a way that spoke profoundly to contemporary readers and speaks to us hardly less relevantly or meaningfully - as it doubtless will continue to long after every vestige of "Main Street" and all it stands for are finally beyond memory.
 Between the smell of the earth and the smell of the city October 30, 2009
J. Green (Los Angeles, California)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
The story of Carol Milford, a free-spirited young woman from St. Paul, Minnesota. She marries Will Kennicott, a country doctor in the town of Gopher Prairie, who is several years older than she is. As she moves to Gopher Prairie she is shocked by how backward the town is and makes attempts to change it: she holds creative parties for their circle of friends, tries to renovate the city hall, starts a drama club. In all her efforts she is derided and criticized by the townsfolk. She only finds the kind of companionship she seeks in some of the town's misfits and lower-classes, but it is never satisfying for her.
Published in 1920, the story takes place in the 1910s and deals with a lot of the social issues prominent then. There are frequent mentions of socialism and worker uprisings coupled with criticisms of capitalism. But the real meat of the story is in it's portrayal of small-town life. At the time, and I guess it's still common today (if you live in cities), country and small town life is idealized as simpler and slower-paced. However, Lewis portrays the townsfolk as provincial and sanctimoniously petty in their gossip and back-stabbing, and frequently hypocritical. He isn't always kind to the city-dwellers either, and it's this societal critique that makes the book such an interesting read.
But he also makes frequent contrasts between how different people view things. Carol revels in the spring wildflowers but a passing farmer comments on the new wheat that is almost 5 inches. After Carol and Will return from an extended trip away all he sees are the improvements that people have made while Carol sees only the garbage and shabbiness of late winter. And Carol reflects on how proper and prim the storefronts on Main Street are, while their backs are weedy and full of rotting wood and vegetables, an obvious allusion to hypocritical townsfolk. One of the enduring messages by book's end seems to be that change takes time.
I was initially very much put off by this biting portrayal, and didn't want to like the book. The plot seems thin and lacking in direction which made the book feel longer than it is (about 450 pages, or 16.5 hours in the audio book I listened to). But I was surprised to identify with some of the characters, sometimes Carol, sometimes Kennicott, sometimes others. There seem to be a lot of layers to the story, as well, from social criticisms to political, differences between men and women, and observations about marriage and family, and I found that a lot of the aspects of the story are still very pertinent to our lives today. In the end I enjoyed this book much more than I had intended. I listened to the audio book format read by Brian Emerson who does a wonderful job reading - his voice lends itself very well to a story about small-town America and to me, he is the voice of Will Kennicott.
Excellent Study of American Society and Character August 26, 2008
CJA (Minneapolis, MN)
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
Sinclair Lewis was the first American to win the Nobel Prize for literature, and, if one were to poll critics and general readers in the 1920s, he would have been ranked as the great novelist of the time -- ahead of Fitzgerald, Faulkner, Hemingway, and Dreiser. Yet, his books were not assigned when I was in high school and college in the 1970s. Dreiser has replaced him as the great exponent of the naturalist school of writing. Much as I love Dreiser, and he clearly influenced Lewis' writing, Lewis' fall from grace is unfortunate. He should be read, and Main Street is an excellent book.
I don't view the book as merely satirical of small town life, and I don't see the characters as paper thin or uninteresting. Carol Kennicott's search for "culture" and attempts to reform small town "Gopher Prairie" are on one level a comical bit of self-deceptive snobbery. But on a deeper level I see Carol as searching for some higher meaning in relentlessly commercial and materialistic America. What she seems to realize in the end is that she needs to build her own independence and sense of self before she can put small town America in its proper place. Ironically enough, when she reforms and changes herself, it forces others to view her differently and, in a way, change themselves(to be sure, quite marginally).
Carol is an attractive character, though to my mind not as compelling as Dreiser's own Sister Carrie. Lewis' strength is his ability to portray the narrow commercialism of small town America (and America generally) and the suffocating power and hypocrisy of "respectability" and middle class morality. It's not simply satire. Lewis is able to paint the nobility and even heroism of Carol's husband, the small town doctor with the determination, professionalism, and imagination to make a difference in the day-to-day lives of his patients. He's a creature of the maddening narrowness of America, and struggles with Carol's frustrations and is not quite respectable in all his dealings, but he's a well-rounded character. In him, Lewis captures some of the strengths as well as the weaknesses of the American character.
I was underwhelmed by the ending. In some ways, it is satisfying that Carol cultivates her own garden and finds the truth that sometimes others will change a bit when we change ourselves as opposed to attempting to change others. But Lewis seems to draw back from the power of his own story -- as if he were afraid to write an American tragedy or to be perceived as too harsh a critic of American life. It's all a bit too pat and uninspired.
On the whole, this is a very good book about the American character and Lewis should be read alongside his peers in this golden age of American literature.
Retelling of George Eliot's Middlemarch January 30, 2008
A. Meyer
Just a brief note to add to the already insightful reviews here: When read as a retelling of George Eliot's Middlemarch, the book takes on yet another dimension. Carol is a modern Dorothea. Also, none of the previous reviews I read mentioned how beautiful some of Lewis's prose is in this work. There are many truly beautiful passages worth reading just in themselves.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 55
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