MAIN STREET
by Sinclair Lewis · first published 1634
7mentions
3recommended by
6HN commenters
2013–2026first – last mentioned
50% recommend50% neutral
The first of his major novels of the 1920s, Sinclair Lewis's Main Street satirizes the manners of the American Middle West. Here is the story of Carol Kennicott, who, to be accepted, must adapt to the ways of Gopher Prairie, Minnesota. This groundbreaking novel attacks conformism, commercialism, moneygrubbing, and the decline in what Lewis saw as the American ideals of freedom and respect for individuality.
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…written (the 1930s, when most of Scandinavia's population lived in such towns). Some parts are distinctively Scandinavian, but in my opinion most are not. For comparison, read Sinclair Lewis's 1920 novel Main Street, a satire of American small-town mentality, and you'll find a very similar mentality being parodied. And you still find it in the U.S. quite a bit; there's a deep suspicion in smaller town and rural areas…
on “The Danish Don't Have the Secret to Happiness” ↗…really makes you think about things differently. Here are a couple of other books that have been pretty influential for me: Democracy for Realists: Why Elections Do Not Produce Responsive Government "Main Street" by Sinclair Lewis
on “Ask HN: Which book helped you understand the world?” ↗…Who cares about the novel, or novelry of science fiction? In this book of ghostly appearance, Bradbury has placed his long empty Sundays, his American tedium, his loneliness, like Sinclair Lewis did on Main Street."
on “There Will Come Soft Rains (1950) [pdf]” ↗…the novel in question was set in such a town). People in small-town and rural America don't like big-city, degree-and-money-having people who "think they're better", either. Sinclair Lewis's 1920 novel Main Street, about small-town American attitudes, has some loose parallels. I think the same is true even today in the US. Some of the people who're lionized in Palo Alto or NYC would be shunned in much of the "heartland",…
on “Having a Servant Is Not a Right” ↗Nah, just social democracy. The "Law of Jante" is a parody of conservative small-town Denmark of ~1900 (a rough American analogue is Main Street by Sinclair Lewis), while social democracy is roughly the opposite, managing the rapidly urbanizing Denmark of 1930s-1980s and using the increasing economic strength to build a well-working, prosperous…
on “France’s Hollande Gets Court Approval for 75% Millionaire Tax” ↗I kind of feel Fitzgerald gets a lot more press than his contemporaries like Dresier, John O' Hara and Sinclair Lewis. How does Gatsby hold up against 'Sister Carrie' or 'An American Trajedy' or 'Main Street' or 'Babbitt'?
on “Why Do We Keep Reading the Great Gatsby?” ↗…version of the truth is only his version. How can he demonstrate the truth as he sees it? He cannot demonstrate it, any more than Mr. Sinclair Lewis can demonstrate that he has told the whole truth about Main Street. And the more he understands his own weaknesses, the more ready he is to admit that where there is no objective test, his own opinion is in some vital measure constructed out of his own stereotypes, according…
on “Half of Americans now believe that news organizations deliberately mislead them” ↗