Sinclair Lewis - The Collected Works of Sinclair Lewis

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This edition includes the complete novels and the iconic short stories of the great Sinclair Lewis:
Novels:
Babbitt
Free Air
Main Street
The Trail of the Hawk
The Innocents
The Job
Our Mr. Wrenn
Arrowsmith
Mantrap
Elmer Gantry
The Man Who Knew Coolidge
Dodsworth
Ann Vickers
Work of Art
It Can't Happen Here
The Prodigal Parents
Bethel Merriday
Gideon Planish
Cass Timberlane
Kingsblood Royal
World So Wide
Short Stories:
Things
Moths in the Arc Light
The Willow Walk
Nature, Inc.
The Cat of the Stars
The Ghost Patrol
The Kidnaped Memorial
Speed
Young Man Axelbrod
Seven Million Dollars
Let's Play King
Land
A Letter From the Queen
The Hack Driver
Go East, Young Man
Little Bear Bongo
Sinclair Lewis (1885-1951) was an American writer and playwright. In 1930, he became the first writer from the United States to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature. He is best known for his novels Main Street, Babbitt, Arrowsmith, and It Can't Happen Here. His works are known for their critical views of American capitalism and materialism in the interwar period. He is also respected for his strong characterizations of modern working women.

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The committee was composed of Carol, Vida Sherwin, Guy Pollock, Raymie Wutherspoon, and Juanita Haydock. They were exalted by the picture of themselves as being simultaneously business-like and artistic. They were entertained by Vida in the parlor of Mrs. Elisha Gurrey's boarding-house, with its steel engraving of Grant at Appomattox, its basket of stereoscopic views, and its mysterious stains on the gritty carpet.

Vida was an advocate of culture-buying and efficiency-systems. She hinted that they ought to have (as at the committee-meetings of the Thanatopsis) a “regular order of business,” and “the reading of the minutes,” but as there were no minutes to read, and as no one knew exactly what was the regular order of the business of being literary, they had to give up efficiency.

Carol, as chairman, said politely, “Have you any ideas about what play we'd better give first?” She waited for them to look abashed and vacant, so that she might suggest “Androcles.”

Guy Pollock answered with disconcerting readiness, “I'll tell you: since we're going to try to do something artistic, and not simply fool around, I believe we ought to give something classic. How about 'The School for Scandal'?”

“Why —— Don't you think that has been done a good deal?”

“Yes, perhaps it has.”

Carol was ready to say, “How about Bernard Shaw?” when he treacherously went on, “How would it be then to give a Greek drama — say 'Oedipus Tyrannus'?”

“Why, I don't believe —— ”

Vida Sherwin intruded, “I'm sure that would be too hard for us. Now I've brought something that I think would be awfully jolly.”

She held out, and Carol incredulously took, a thin gray pamphlet entitled “McGinerty's Mother-in-law.” It was the sort of farce which is advertised in “school entertainment” catalogues as:

Riproaring knock-out, 5 m. 3 f., time 2 hrs., interior set, popular with churches and all high-class occasions.

Carol glanced from the scabrous object to Vida, and realized that she was not joking.

“But this is — this is — why, it's just a —— Why, Vida, I thought you appreciated — well — appreciated art.”

Vida snorted, “Oh. Art. Oh yes. I do like art. It's very nice. But after all, what does it matter what kind of play we give as long as we get the association started? The thing that matters is something that none of you have spoken of, that is: what are we going to do with the money, if we make any? I think it would be awfully nice if we presented the high school with a full set of Stoddard's travel-lectures!”

Carol moaned, “Oh, but Vida dear, do forgive me but this farce —— Now what I'd like us to give is something distinguished. Say Shaw's 'Androcles.' Have any of you read it?”

“Yes. Good play,” said Guy Pollock.

Then Raymie Wutherspoon astoundingly spoke up:

“So have I. I read through all the plays in the public library, so's to be ready for this meeting. And —— But I don't believe you grasp the irreligious ideas in this 'Androcles,' Mrs. Kennicott. I guess the feminine mind is too innocent to understand all these immoral writers. I'm sure I don't want to criticize Bernard Shaw; I understand he is very popular with the highbrows in Minneapolis; but just the same —— As far as I can make out, he's downright improper! The things he SAYS —— Well, it would be a very risky thing for our young folks to see. It seems to me that a play that doesn't leave a nice taste in the mouth and that hasn't any message is nothing but — nothing but —— Well, whatever it may be, it isn't art. So —— Now I've found a play that is clean, and there's some awfully funny scenes in it, too. I laughed out loud, reading it. It's called 'His Mother's Heart,' and it's about a young man in college who gets in with a lot of free-thinkers and boozers and everything, but in the end his mother's influence —— ”

Juanita Haydock broke in with a derisive, “Oh rats, Raymie! Can the mother's influence! I say let's give something with some class to it. I bet we could get the rights to 'The Girl from Kankakee,' and that's a real show. It ran for eleven months in New York!”

“That would be lots of fun, if it wouldn't cost too much,” reflected Vida.

Carol's was the only vote cast against “The Girl from Kankakee.”

II

She disliked “The Girl from Kankakee” even more than she had expected. It narrated the success of a farm-lassie in clearing her brother of a charge of forgery. She became secretary to a New York millionaire and social counselor to his wife; and after a well-conceived speech on the discomfort of having money, she married his son.

There was also a humorous office-boy.

Carol discerned that both Juanita Haydock and Ella Stowbody wanted the lead. She let Juanita have it. Juanita kissed her and in the exuberant manner of a new star presented to the executive committee her theory, “What we want in a play is humor and pep. There's where American playwrights put it all over these darn old European glooms.”

As selected by Carol and confirmed by the committee, the persons of the play were:

John Grimm, a millionaire . . . . Guy Pollock

His wife. . . . . . . . . Miss Vida Sherwin

His son . . . . . . . . . Dr. Harvey Dillon

His business rival. . . . . . . Raymond T. Wutherspoon

Friend of Mrs. Grimm . . . . . . Miss Ella Stowbody

The girl from Kankakee . . . . . Mrs. Harold C. Haydock

Her brother. . . . . . . . Dr. Terence Gould

Her mother . . . . . . . . Mrs. David Dyer

Stenographer . . . . . . . . Miss Rita Simons

Office-boy . . . . . . . . Miss Myrtle Cass

Maid in the Grimms' home . . . . Mrs. W. P. Kennicott

Direction of Mrs. Kennicott

Among the minor lamentations was Maud Dyer's “Well of course I suppose I look old enough to be Juanita's mother, even if Juanita is eight months older than I am, but I don't know as I care to have everybody noticing it and —— ”

Carol pleaded, “Oh, my DEAR! You two look exactly the same age. I chose you because you have such a darling complexion, and you know with powder and a white wig, anybody looks twice her age, and I want the mother to be sweet, no matter who else is.”

Ella Stowbody, the professional, perceiving that it was because of a conspiracy of jealousy that she had been given a small part, alternated between lofty amusement and Christian patience.

Carol hinted that the play would be improved by cutting, but as every actor except Vida and Guy and herself wailed at the loss of a single line, she was defeated. She told herself that, after all, a great deal could be done with direction and settings.

Sam Clark had boastfully written about the dramatic association to his schoolmate, Percy Bresnahan, president of the Velvet Motor Company of Boston. Bresnahan sent a check for a hundred dollars; Sam added twenty-five and brought the fund to Carol, fondly crying, “There! That'll give you a start for putting the thing across swell!”

She rented the second floor of the city hall for two months. All through the spring the association thrilled to its own talent in that dismal room. They cleared out the bunting, ballot-boxes, handbills, legless chairs. They attacked the stage. It was a simple-minded stage. It was raised above the floor, and it did have a movable curtain, painted with the advertisement of a druggist dead these ten years, but otherwise it might not have been recognized as a stage. There were two dressing-rooms, one for men, one for women, on either side. The dressing-room doors were also the stage-entrances, opening from the house, and many a citizen of Gopher Prairie had for his first glimpse of romance the bare shoulders of the leading woman.

There were three sets of scenery: a woodland, a Poor Interior, and a Rich Interior, the last also useful for railway stations, offices, and as a background for the Swedish Quartette from Chicago. There were three gradations of lighting: full on, half on, and entirely off.

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