Describe Appertaining To Books Babbitt
| Title | : | Babbitt |
| Author | : | Sinclair Lewis |
| Book Format | : | Paperback |
| Book Edition | : | Special Edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 348 pages |
| Published | : | May 29th 2008 by BiblioLife (first published 1922) |
| Categories | : | Fiction. Classics. Literature |
Sinclair Lewis
Paperback | Pages: 348 pages Rating: 3.66 | 20774 Users | 1217 Reviews
Representaion Toward Books Babbitt
The Success of Failure Babbitt is perhaps the first comic novel of mid-life crisis. It shows Lewis at his most Dickens-like, creating prototypical American characters that live on in cultural mythology. The issue is this: How does an imperfect male human being, knowing his flaws only too well, make his way in an equally flawed society - without sacrificing either his own integrity or his ability to participate in that society? Lewis answer: Essentially he can't. Everything is irrational compromise. Plato's Socrates came to the same conclusion in the Republic. It is also the inevitability posed by Camus in his letters. It was the third century Christian theologian Tertullian who came up with the most precise formulation: Credo quia absurdum est, I believe in it because it is absurd. Babbitt's middle class American life is an absurdity. That he comes to terms with this absurdity is his, and our, only hope. Highly recommended as literary therapy during the reign of Donald Trump... or to understand where Philip Roth finds much of his inspiration.Itemize Books Conducive To Babbitt
| Original Title: | Babbitt |
| ISBN: | 142640607X (ISBN13: 9781426406072) |
| Edition Language: | English |
Rating Appertaining To Books Babbitt
Ratings: 3.66 From 20774 Users | 1217 ReviewsWrite-Up Appertaining To Books Babbitt
Given that Babbitt was published in 1922, I expected to travel back in time and experience life of the 1920s. I expected to be transported to a different era. I expected to be greeted by a foreign world. And, instead, I mostly felt firmly planted in modern day. Yes, it is true that the language and manner of speaking is different. Its by golly this and by gosh that. But, the themes and all of the satire still speak to the human experience of modern day. And in that way, I found the novel to be"Same with you. All we do is cut each other's throats and make the public pay for it."Babbitt is a novel written by the American novelist Sinclair Lewis and was first published in 1922. It follows the story of the Babbitt family, specially George F. Babbitt, who lives in the city of Zenith, among a majority of middle-class Americans who aspire to live by certain standards that determine their social worthiness.Lewis tried through the character of George F. Babbitt to criticize the social life in
The Pulitzer Prize for Fiction - formerly the Pulitzer Prize for the Novel - has long been one of the most respectable and important accolades in American literature. It is, as we all know, awarded to the greatest literature (in the eyes of the jury) produced by an American author in the preceding year. Always has been. But the definition of great literature has changed a little over time, not just when it comes to vague perceptions, but even as regards explicit definitions. For example, in the
I had never read anything by Sinclair Lewis, but he was put on my radar when it was mentioned in a library school class that the heroine of his book "Main Street" began her 'career' as a librarian. When I saw the audio version of "Babbitt" at the library, I decided to give it a listen. I was drawn in immediately by the detailed description of daily life in the USA in 1920. George F. Babbitt is a middle-aged realtor living in Zenith, a medium-sized town in middle America. Lewis' portrait of
I rarely change my mind about a book based on the way it ends. With this book, I make an exception. I went through various phases with this book. To start, it seemed like a fun satire of one of the most shallow characters imaginable. George Babbit is a real estate man, utterly conventional, and without a thought or opinion of his own. He defines himself by the products he buys. He doesn't know what to think about something unless he's read the opinion in the editorials (conservative, of course).
Contemporary satirists would do well to reread Sinclair Lewis and learn something that doesn't always come through in, say, Little Children or The Emperor's Children: Lewis has a way of making you feel for his characters. I suppose it's a fine distinction between ridiculing social mores and ridiculing the folks who practice them (knowingly or not), but it strikes me as an important one. I guess I'm a sap and I want to like my main characters---or, rather, I want to like them for their
Another re-read of a high school book. My current paperback is actually the same edition/cover as the one I read way back when, so I had to choose a different one, also Signet from 1961. So far it's pretty easy to read, but dated, obviously. One balks at the portrayal of the family and its Patriarch, but SL grew up in the midwest(Zenith = St. Paul/Minneapolis ... Des Moines ...Cincinnati etc.) so he gets the benefit of the doubt. This society-history portrait goes back a bit less than a hundred
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