Main Street: The Story of Carol Kennicott

Sinclair Lewis

Harcourt, Brace and Howe, 1920 - Fiction - 451 pages

The story of Main Street is seen through the eyes of Carol Kennicott, a young woman married to a Midwestern doctor who settles in the Minnesota town of Gopher Prairie (modeled on Lewis' hometown of Sauk Center). The power of the book derives from Lewis' careful rendering of local speech, customs, and social amenities. The satire is double-edged--directed against both the townspeople and the superficial intellectualism of those who despise them.

Contents

• Section 1: 12
• Section 2: 20
• Section 3: 31
• Section 4: 54
• Section 5: 81
• Section 6: 93
• Section 7: 99
• Section 8: 124
• Section 9: 145
• Section 10: 161
• Section 11: 176
• Section 12: 195
• Section 13: 217
• Section 14: 230
• Section 15: 240
• Section 16: 262
• Section 17: 274
• Section 18: 287
• Section 19: 306
• Section 20: 316
• Section 21: 323
• Section 22: 326
• Section 23: 341
• Section 24: 356
• Section 25: 377
• Section 26: 390
• Section 27: 404
• Section 28: 411
• Section 29: 425
• Section 30: 431
• Section 31: 444

About the author

Harry Sinclair Lewis was born on February 7, 1885 in Minnesota. He was an American novelist, short-story writer, and playwright. In 1930, he became the first writer from the United States to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature. A lonely child, Lewis immersed himself in reading and diary writing. While studying at Yale University and living in writer Upton Sinclair's communal house, he wrote for Yale Literary Magazine and helped to build the Panama Canal. After graduating from Yale in 1908, Lewis began writing fiction, publishing 22 novels by the end of his career. His early works, while often praised by literary critics, did not reach popularity but with Main Street (1920), Babbitt (1922), Arrowsmith (1925), Elmer Gantry (1927), and Dodsworth (1929), Sinclair Lewis achieved fame as a writer. His style of choice was satire; he explored American small-town life, conformity, hypocrisy, and materialism. Sinclair Lewis was married and divorced twice. As his career wound down, he spent his later life in Europe and died in Rome on January 10, 1951.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Main Street: The Story of Carol Kennicott; Harbrace modern classics
• Author: Sinclair Lewis
• Edition: illustrated
• Publisher: Harcourt, Brace and Howe, 1920
• Original from: the New York Public Library
• Digitized: Jun 30, 2014
• ISBN: 0722247737, 9780722247730
• Length: 451 pages
• Subjects: Fiction / Family Life / Marriage & Divorce; Fiction / General