In 1920s America, George Babbitt has it all. He lives in an up-and-coming, prosperous town. He has a family and two children. He has a successful job. He’s not a superman. No, he’s neither a CEO of a large corporation, nor a super-rich business tycoon, nor a famous celebrity. Nonetheless, he’s living a good life. But something suddenly happens to one of his close friends, and he calls his entire life into question.
Today, we would call this event a “mid-life crisis.” Babbitt indulges in behaviors that he’s always wanted to explore. He parties. He drinks. He fools around. He stops associating with upright people. His family and his business associates are aghast. Will he recover? If so, how? And is human redemption even possible?
Written in the so-called “Roaring ’20s,” this book addressed an American society drunk with economic prosperity. The frank need to survive in the Great Depression had not hit yet. Interestingly, this book also was a success in Great Britain, with its similarly advanced industrial economy. As with works like The Great Gatsby, this book addressed social problems of how to live in a time of materialism.
Although some terms of modern life have changed in the postindustrial and postfeminist age, the philosophical problems of life’s meaning have not. Since Sinclair Lewis penned this book, women’s roles in the world have changed dramatically as have the centrality of American institutions. But we still need to find our place in the world. We still question whether material comfort is all there is to life. We still need to placate our regrets and guilt. Today, we might read Babbitt and relegate it to a prior age of indulgence and fixed social structures. However, when we are honest with ourselves, we all reflect George Babbitt more than we realize. That’s what makes this book a timeless classic.
Babbitt
By Sinclair Lewis
Copyright (c) 1922
Oxford University Press
ISBN13 9780199567690
Page Count: 344
Genre: Classics, Fiction
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