Babbitt

by Sinclair Lewis

Book Overview

The masterpiece of Nobel Prize winner Sinclair Lewis

A Penguin Classic

George F. Babbitt, a conniving, prosperous real estate man from Zenith, Ohio, revels in his popularity, his success, and, especially, in the material rewards they bring. He bullies his wife, flirts with other women, and patronizes the less successful. But when his best friend is sent to prison for killing his wife, Babbitt's middle-class complacency...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0140189025
• ISBN13: 9780140189025
• Release Date: April 1996
• Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
• Length: 400 Pages
• Weight: 0.66 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.1" x 7.8"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

Great Experience

the book arrived on time and in great condition, wish this provider had all the books that I need.

Sinclair Lewis' greatest novel

Although this book was written in the 1920's,it remains timeless. George Babbitt is a middle class, self-satisfied,self-inflating business man who finds that his life is missing something he cannot identify and he is not happy. He has every material item he wants and he delights in them but he drifted into his career and marriage because he is basically weak and he finds no real enthusiasm with both. He is not ethical in his business but he does not face up to this. He tries to go back to nature by camping and hiking and this does not lessen his dissatisfaction. Then a crisis involving his best friend sends him into a way of thinking which is different from that of the leaders of the town and more radical.He also embarks on an affair with a woman, although he begins to realize she is very shallow. His whole way of life is at risk. However, a sudden illness of his wife brings him back and he soon resumes his former way of life and regains his status in the town. The book can be read as a look into the personality of that type of man or as an examination of the ways,ethics and morals of that type of society that can still exist to-day.

Great read

This book was awesome.. a great read. Only complaint is that one time I was reading on the place and my neighbor recognized it as a classic and decided to use that as a way to start talking to me. She was one of those people that talks at you and not to you.. ugh. But I digress. This book was interesting the whole way through and then at the end when the message of the whole book got delieved, I was blown away. It is rare that a book has that effect and it has shaped (at least a little bit) how I look at life and how you live it.

A Man and the City

Lewis was an enormously successful writer in the 1920s (really on the same level as Hemmingway and Fitzgerald), but he has faded and is hardly read today. This, however, has no bearing on the importance of his writing. His writings reveal the social realities and concerns of his time. He focuses on individuals not communities (not bound together in any organic way). He is also skeptical about success and the American dream. There is a real sense of contempt toward the middle-class in Lewis. He really fills in a gap in The Great Gatsby, which included old money, new money, and the working class, but where is the middle class. As a result, Lewis' is famous for satirizing the middle class. Lewis wrote Babbitt in 1922, and based it on sociological research in Midwestern cities. He spent months simply observing. A little backgroud information: first, George F. Babbitt is a real-estate agent and land has become a commodity in the 1920s. Second, the reader presumes Babbitt to have been a progressive in his younger years since his son is named Theodore Roosevelt Babbitt. Third, Babbitt is going through a midlife crisis. Lewis offers a satirical view of Middle American life. Lewis is closely attuned to the nuances of social classes. Within the middle class Lewis teases out differences in rank (lower-middle and upper-middle). He examines social conformity and the pressures of the group on behavior. Lewis also observes the new mass culture and the automobile's impact. Also adding to the success and interest of Babbitt is the fact that Babit can be read as an authentic, fully developed character throughout the novel. Babbitt is a success but he has a tremendous feeling of longing for things not accomplished due to social reality. Babbitt is a conservative, but quite amazingly he becomes involved in a socialist's campaign. His character is transforming. He even joins a bohemian circle (Lewis offers a description for the counter-culture). He realizes that there are social conformities that exist in this small group of Bohemians as well as in "normal" middle class. Lewis also turns away from the city and towards the wilderness. This encounter with nature represents that chance of reenergizing or rejuvenating. Babbitt goes to a fishing camp where Joe Paradise is the guide. But Babbitt realizes that there are no more canoes. Instead they have been replaced with motor boats. However, there are still no cities or stores. Joe tells Babbitt that he would move to the city and open a store if he had the money to do so. This is a pivotal point in Lewis' story. Joe Paradise wants the life that Babbitt has and finds so frustrating. Babbitt realizes that he is shaped by the city. The one real change that Babbitt makes in his life occur is in the realm of family intimacy. His marriage is dead in the beginning of the book, but his wife has a medical emergency. It is in that situation that Babit rediscovers his love for his w

So those were the good old days?

George F. Babbitt is middle-aged and middle-class. He lives in a medium-sized home in a medium-sized city in the Middle West. He's a middleman--he sells real estate. He went to a state university and depends on his secretary to fix the spelling and grammar in his letters. His children fight over who gets to use the car. His life is pretty straight and narrow, until he begins an affair when his wife is out of town and all of a sudden things aren't so middle-of-the-road anymore.Sound like anyone you know? But "Babbitt" was published--almost unbelievably--in 1922. Funny how little some things have changed. Lewis's satire on suburban life and its conformities was an instant hit. Even today, we know what a Babbitt is--a guy who's all show and no go--whose lifestyle and opinions have been furnished for him but maybe whose soul is a little out of whack. It's a pity that schools usually assign the much slower-paced "Main Street". Read "Main Street" to see what life used to be like. Read "Babbitt" to see how we got to where we are today.