Sister Carrie and An American Tragedy both explore the American Dream (or, simply, young aspirations) gone awry. The latter is largely viewed as a major success for Dreiser and for 20th Century realist American literature (I say, not being an American). The former, as I understand it, was more of a financial failure.

I do not understand why.

The desitute rocking chair is just as despairing an end as an electric one.

What is done sensationally in Tragedy is done softly, almost meditatively, in Carrie. Perhaps the backstory build-up is more intense in the former, as allegiances shift in the reader. But, I don't know, could we not say that of Drouet and Hurstwood in the latter?

At the same time, the religiosity and construct of sucess DOES make Tragedy the richer read. But then, Carrie was one of his first. And I confess the conclusion of Carrie is a bit didactic, but to me, that fit with the tone. Again, we had our morals fixed in place from the start: do we need the bangs and crashes in order to illustrate this is NOT a how-to guide?



"Carrie passed along the busy aisles, nuch affected by the remarkable displays of trinkets, dress goods, stationery, and jewelry... She could not help feeling the claim of each trinket and valuable upon her personally, and yet she did not stop. Thete was nothing there which she could not have used - nothing which she did not long to own" (p. 31)

"How true it is that words are but the vague shadows of the volumes we mean. Little audible links, they are, chaining together great inaudible feelings and purposes" (p. 11)