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A GRAND HOTEL NOVEL FOR "BOY SCOUTS AND ROTARIANS"
Sinclair Lewis may have written more about "service" and the art of being useful to others than any other American novelist. Sometimes he praisesaltruistic service. More often he skewers hypocritical politeness and feigned kindness as mere marketing ploys to sell inferior products. His 1934 novel about hotels and hotel management, WORK OF ART, is especially heavy on attention to service.

In WORK OF ART three generations of the Weagle family grow up in and work for boarding houses, inns and hotels. Focus is on two brothers, Myron and Ora, of the second generation. Poetic, ethereal Ora could not wait to escape hotel drudgery, though never too proud to ask plodding Myron for money.

As Myron thought, learned and managed a steady climb to national respect within the expanding world of early 20th Century hotel managers, he was always skeptical when praised for "creativity" at Rotary Club luncheons and Chamber of Commerce dinners. He dreamed minutely of the shape of his perfect inn or dream hotel: its napkins, its menus, its front desks, its coddling of guests. Yet he never quite pulled off perfection.

Myron argued with younger brother Ora about whether it was even possible to combine money making with administering institutions. "Maybe there were business men, and successful ones, who were not money grubbers, but creators, he suggested" (Ch.4). Myron tried hard to combine these two talents, but never quite succeeded. If anyone could pull this combination off, it was the much admired traveling salesman, J. Hector Warlock whom Myron began noticing when only 15 while front desking the family owned American Hotel in Black Thread, Connecticut. Warlock "could sell fleece-lined overshoes in hell! (Ch. 4) Over time he convinced Myron that all trades evolve: barbering becomes surgery. Taverns become inns, become hotels and someday most people will live in hotels instead of houses.

Young Myron learned the service dimension of just being friendly from American Hotel bartender Jock McCreedy. Bartenders held democratic court in pre-Prohibition America. Myron Weagle learned as wellto manage inebriated businessmen and "lonely and love-starved women" (Ch. 9) living in hotels. By 1904 theoreticians of hotel management were already agreed that a hotel staffer owed guests "a metaphysical blessing called 'Service'; that he should be at once the Little Brother and the Kind Uncle of everyone who registered -- call them by name ... and ask them tenderly about the Folks, illnesses, weather, and business conditions Back Home" (Ch. 11). But Myron never excelled in "oozing unfelt cordiality."

Myron came to admire the great hotels as excelling even churches, universities, forts and hospitals for knowing "the heart and blood circulation of history" (Ch. 11). He met and liked Luciano Mora, whose family had kept six generations of inns and hotels in Naples. Together they fanatically glorified "innkeeping as veritably an art" (Ch. 15). Hotel management was far more than just an interesting way to make a living.

COMMENT: In February 1905 the Rotary Club of Chicago was created, launching the entire service club movement. In this centennial year 2005 Rotarians are learning that it was in 1934's WORK OF ART that a prissy school superintendent in Black Thread, Connecticut made a much quoted linkage between "two great spiritual awakenings": Boy Scoutism and Rotarianism: "a Boy Scout is a young Rotarian, and every Rotarian is a Boy Scout in long trousers!" (Ch. 17)

Mryon rose. Myron fell. Myron bounced back. In 1932, towards novel's end, in his early 50s with his management career in shreds, he used his last savings for a hot summer drive with family to tiny Lemuel, Kansas. Things looked bleak and dull but Myron's "Rotarian enthusiasm," comic though it was, propelled him on.In Kansas Myron built and then transformed The Commercial Hotel. But minor magic came as well. For the first time ever, his wife Effie May became "a hotelman's wife" as had Myron's mother before her. Teen age son Luke Weagle, age 16 in 1933, also opted for a future in hoteling and warmed his father by suggesting a great developmentsite for a new approach to America's rising world of automobile tourists, whose idea of a vacation was simply to drive all over the place for the sheer fun of driving on passable roads.

Sinclair Lewis, as always, tells a great yarn: this time about the ups and downs in a rising America's unending pursuit of craftsmanship and material success.

-OOO-

The career of an hotelman at the begining of the century
This is an interesting book I have not read in a long time about a self made hotelman.Sinclair Lewis's descriptions of large hotels with big kitchens and numerous staff are most interesting in their accuracy. ... Read more

Product Description
The most beloved works of Sinclair Lewis in one collection. This edition includes an active table of contents. This edition includes:

Babbitt
Main Street
The Trail of the Hawk

If you like this book make sure and check out other books in the "Greatest Hits Series." ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (11)

Is this About the Book or about Touting
I believe I counted 11, count 'em, 5 stars for this book, and it appeared that all 11 reviews were from the same person, all in glowing terms.Maybe this book is good; maybe it is bad.Maybe it is great scholarship.However, until I go to the University of Scranton and look at this work, I am highly suspect of 11 glowing reviews, and nothing else, on one book, and from one reviewer, who acts as his own football team.I will change my review after I look at the book, or after I see some convincing proof that the hydra-headed praise here is independently warranted.

Research Made Interesting
This book was a lifesaver. As a book collector, I cannot tell you how important a bibliography formatted like Pastore's can be. I wish he would write more. BRAVO to him for writing and to AMAZON.COM for carrying thisbook.

Honest and concise
This book provides the most honest and concise bibliography of one of the foremost authors of our time and Mr. Pastore has essentially re-engineered how a bibliography should be written - that "thin" can be betterthan "fat".

REFRESHING AND INTELLIGENT
All (ALL!!) bibliographies should be this clear and TO THE POINT. I hope this bibliographer works on some other authors. What value!!!

Clear and concise
Intelligent and thoughtful analysis of a very difficult author. Quite nice, really and beautifully presented. ... Read more

Product Description
The Rise of Sinclair Lewis examines the making of Lewis's best-selling novels Main Street, Babbitt, Arrowsmith, and Elmer Gantry their sources, composition, publication, and subsequent critical reception. Drawing on thousands of pages of material from Lewis s notes, outlines, and drafts most of it never before published James M. Hutchisson shows how Lewis selected usable materials and shaped them, through his unique vision, into novels that reached and remained part of the American literary imagination. Hutchisson also describes for the first time how large a role was played by Lewis s wives, assistants, and publishers in determining the final shape of his books. ... Read more

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This study provides readers with a comprehensive view of novelist Sinclair Lewis as an avid reader and literary critic. ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (5)

Thank you, Sinclair Lewis
If you made a short list of notable literary efforts from America's first Nobel Prize in Literature winner, the inestimable Sinclair Lewis, titles such as "Main Street," "Babbitt," and "Elmer Gantry" would probably sit near the top. More discerning fans of the master satirist might throw in "Dodsworth," "It Can't Happen Here," and "Kingsblood Royal." What you wouldn't find anywhere on this speculative list are the short stories between the pages of "If I Were Boss: The Early Business Stories of Sinclair Lewis." Why? According to the intricate yet astoundingly informative introduction by Anthony Di Renzo, none of the fifteen stories contained in the anthology have been republished since their original appearance between the years 1915-1921 in magazines like "The Saturday Evening Post." If you stagger under the knowledge that works of a Nobel Prize winner have been out of print that long, you'll really have a fit once you read this collection. Every one of the tales in this book is wonderful. Everything you know about Lewis-his scathing wit, his boundless cynicism tempered with a secret hope for the triumph of humanity, his spot on ability to recreate the American vernacular-infuses every page of every story.

If I had to pick a specific story as my personal favorite, I would pick the four stories that make up what is the Lancelot Todd cycle. Lewis spent many years of his life working in advertising, loathed the profession, and promptly took his revenge with stories like "Snappy Display," "Slip It to 'Em," "Getting His Bit," and "Jazz." These four tales document the unsavory career of Lancelot Todd, America's premier advertising guru and an unbridled charlatan. Always on the lookout for the perfect con, Todd spends his days writing peppy newsletters for large business concerns and spewing out self-help books designed to teach the workingman how to get ahead. He devotes his free time to seeking a higher position in society and cultivating a cirrhotic liver. Lewis scathingly paints a picture of Todd's machinations only to bring him down in the end as his latest caper falls apart. The best example is "Slip It to 'Em," where Todd runs a car company into the ground only to find he must transport his latest wealthy conquest to an important meeting in one of the lemons his company foisted on the public. You haven't laughed until you have read a Lancelot Todd story. The only thing I could think of after these four stories was where I could get my hands on more of them.

All of the stories in the collection pertain to issues still relevant today. In "If I Were Boss," salesman Charley McClure strives to make a name for himself at his firm only to discover the same issues he excoriated his own boss for come back to haunt him years later when he runs the show. "Honestly-If Possible" explores the sometimes painful relationship between men and women in the office place. So does "A Story with a Happy Ending," but in a different way. Leonard Price eventually undergoes the humiliating experience of working for a woman he initially hired years before. The confusing experience of workplace conflicts finds expression in "Way I See It," where Lewis uses a shifting perspective to examine the contentious relationship between a rental agent and his boss. Even corporate takeovers and office backstabbing get a spotlight in "The Whisperer," an unnerving tale about a fast buck quack obliterating his internal opposition in his bid for the top spot at an unprofitable pharmaceutical company. Repeatedly, I was amazed at how the many issues Lewis raises in these stories continue to have importance in today's corporate world. It would seem we haven't advanced very far since the 1910s and 1920s, at least regarding gender roles and business ethics.

Don't think for a minute that Lewis completely despises his subjects. In "The Good Sport," the author brings one of those fly by night, wiseacre salesman who run from job to job down to earth in a particularly humbling yet ennobling way. "A Matter of Business" finds a businessman agonizing over whether to remain loyal to a local supplier or whether to buy trendy yet shoddy products from a national concern. The last story, "Number Seven to Sagapoose," is a truly beautiful heart wrencher about a traveling shoe salesman's ability to make a huge difference in the lives of certain individuals and, by extension, humanity as a whole. It is in these stories that we see Lewis's caustic barbs and deep cynicism stripped away to reveal a man who fervently hoped that mankind could overcome its ridiculous social constructions and petty trappings in order to achieve a higher, nobler purpose.

As I closed the cover to "If I Were Boss" for the final time, I felt a deep kinship with Sinclair Lewis, realizing that he and I share many of the same thought processes and beliefs. I couldn't help but think that I would have gotten along just fine with Lewis if I had personally known him. I think I understand him as a person, however misguided that assumption might be, and now realize how difficult his life must have been. When one sees humanity in the way Lewis sees it, when one recognizes the pettiness and banalities we surround ourselves with, one quickly understands how difficult it is to function in life. That's why I think Lewis relied so heavily on humor in his stories: if you cannot laugh at the utter ridiculousness of modern life, you will quickly find yourself screaming with rage. These insights on my part hint at the powerful qualities of the author's stories and his writing ability. If you're the eternal cynic who can still laugh, pick this book up right away.

Marvelous Stories Display a Little-Known Side of Lewis
While I have enjoyed Lewis's novels, I have also found them to be somewhat angry and bitter.These stories are a different matter.Several of them are uproariously funny, in many ways reminiscent of Ring Lardner's best, where the outrage is hidden behind a mask of humor.

The introduction provides an interesting background in terms of both America's history and the events of Lewis's own life.

Excellent Collection of Short Stories
I was surprised at how relevant the stories were to the current times.Despite being written between 1915 and the early 1920's, workers ( and employers ) were faced with problems of sexual harrasment, boredom,stealing employees, and office politics.

Definately, you can detect partsof Babbit in many of the characters in the book.

All of the stories wereworth reading.Some are amusing, some sad, and a few happy.All of them,however are thought provoking.

Overall, a great book to get a hold of,especially if you are a Sinclair Lewis fan.

I hope we are entering a Sinclair renaisance...
"Honestly, if Possible" may quite possibly be the most wonderful short story I've ever read. Like other newer Sinclair readers, I'm amazed with the currency of all his work, and even more amazed that he isn't more widely known. I'm doing my best to get the story out-I've got a lot of PEP!

Surprisingly timely.
Lewis' early magazine pieces, printed here for the first time since their original publication in 1915-23, unmistakably contain the seeds of his later Pulitzer Prize-winning satirical novels and are irresistible in their own right.
The language is dated, and the modern reader may find some usage jarring (e.g., "love-making" for what we might call "flirting"), but it is remarkable in this postmodern age of Dilbert and e-mail that so little has changed in human nature, especially as expressed in office romances and politics. Look closely and you may see in some of Lewis' hucksters someone looking back at you; someone uncomfortably familiar.
(P) (The "score" rating is an ineradicable feature of the page. This reviewer does not "score" books.) ... Read more

Product Description
Originally published in 1915.This volume from the Cornell University Library's print collections was scanned on an APT BookScan and converted to JPG 2000 format by Kirtas Technologies.All titles scanned cover to cover and pages may include marks notations and other marginalia present in the original volume. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Can eden be re-entered after the fall?
Carl Ericson, born in the same 1885 and in the same small town Minnesota as Sinclair Lewis, is the hero of Lewis's second novel, THE TRAIL OF THE HAWK (1915). Early on,mentors at home and in college convince Carl that there is something better than routine, conformity and merely making a living. Somewhere out on a long trail, possibly a trail with no end, there is a goal, a state of being, that will leave anyone contented, happy and living at the outermost limit of his talents.

Carl Ericson has a bent for mechanical things: automobiles, gliders. After being expelled from mediocre Plato College for defending an unorthodox teacher, he wanders for many months through countries and occupations. Nothing holds him for long until, in California, he senses that he was meant to be a pilot. He proves one of the best of the flying pioneers, is called a "Hawk of the Birdmen" and is transformed into Hawk Ericson, hero to rich and poor, to common people and aristocrats. All but inevitably, however, in those dangerous early days of racing and barnstorming monoplanes and biplanes, the Hawk crashes and goes into hospital.

Prudence damps down his soaring. He finds a job with an automobile manufacturer, invests his flying winnings in the company's efforts to create an early "RV," and proves a solid craftsman and leader of men doing important work. But Carl was now "a dethroned prince. He had been accustomed to a more than royal court of admirers. Now he was a nobody the moment he went twenty freet from his desk" (Ch. XXIV).

Was there anything that would prevent Hawk from bolting once again from on the job hum drum? From hitting the trail all alone once more yearning for something higher and better? It might be that love of the right woman would give him excitement off the job. He had several choices, Gertie, his old boyhood pal, soft, plump, stable or Ruth, a thin aristocratic friend made in New York. Ruth sparkles, is amusing and shares with Hawk the heart of a carefree vagabond. Gertie is unwilling even to walk out into the snow with Hawk. Ruth, by contrast, is willing to run off with him to the South Seas. Ruth, in the end, becomes the female "playmate" that Carl has always needed. One kiss (Ch.XXXIX) "and Carl knew that life's real adventure is not adventuring, but finding the playmate with whom to quest life's meaning." The coming of World War One in August 1914 overcomes the rich girl's doubts about living what may be a life of privation and Hawk and Ruth wed.

They have a vocation they can clearly share, "keeping clear of vocations" (Ch XLII). They sail in February 1915 for Argentina aboard the S.S. Sangrael (Holy Grail). In Buenos Aires, Hawk will sell American automobiles, at least for a while. After that, Hawk and Ruth Ericsonwill hit the upward trail together and stay on it as long as they can, spreading "Madness among the Respectable."

In Carl (Hawk) Ericson there is presented the recurring Sinclair Lewis male hero who is never content for long where he is, who must always roam "somewhere else," to "greener pastures." Only once does a Lewis protagonist, Dr. Arrowsmith, find something close to paradise and that only by renouncing ordinary human man-woman love for life in an ascetic community of celibate males. Contentment is not something likelyto be found on this earth or in anything this world offers.

One of the Lewis's First
Trail of the Hawk is one of Lewis's first works.It the story of the life of Carl "Hawk" Ericson, from rural Minnesota.Carl is an enterprising young man whose passion in life revolves around engines.Heis a wandering heart and his life's story takes the reader to manydifferent places.

The bulk of the story takes place in his late teens andtwenties during the 1910's.He attends college where eventually he isbooted out for supporting a socialistic teacher.Carl turns this to hisadvantage as he tramps about the country doing jobs for short periods oftime and seeing America.Eventually, though, his interest is taken in bythe burgeoning airplane industry.With some saved money, he invests inlessons.

Lewis captures the excitement of the airplane era -- tossingabout names like the Wright brothers and predicts what planes will do inthe future (which we take for granted today).Ericson becomes a premierepilot and races nationally.His fame becomes wide-spread.

Fearing themortal dangers of flying an airplane, he retires.However, he meets Ruth,a woman who he falls in love with.Ultimately, they marry, but Carl has awandering heart.After some turmoil, he and his wife learn to avoid thestaticness of marriage and the another day another dollar routine.

Lewisgoes everywhere in this book.Socialism, one of his persistent plots,plays a minor role in this book and doesn't jump out at the reader likeBabbitt.Also, some parts of the book were extremely dull and rambling. However, Lewis's main focal point is that people should live life and avoidthe dullness people get into.He states it best in the closing line: "How bully it is to be living, if you don't have to give up living inorder to make a living." ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

I don't know who George F. Babbitt is.
I just spent fourteen hours over the last couple of weeks with George F. Babbitt, listening to the audio version of Babbitt.I wouldn't recommend his company to anyone.He is a joiner, follower, flaky, unreliable and a man of no agency.Things happen to him and he acts or reacts trying to sound out what he thinks others might think best of him.

George F. Babbitt is not my friend, no matter how much time I have spent with him recently.I wouldn't suspect you want to be his friend either.I suppose that this is a credit to what I think of your character.As for Babbitt though, he is an interesting character, but I don't know if Lewis created a new archetype or just adapted one.I think this is a triumph no matter, as he created a character sketch that is effective but never defines the character.

I still don't know who George F. Babbitt is, do you?

Good read, but protagonist is a straw man
I came across an editorial recently referring to a "Babbit-type" person and decided it was time to read this book. It was a good read. At times I laughed aloud. There were passages I was tempted to memorize for quoting. I did care what happened to Babbit.

But I'd like to alert young readers that despite Lewis' efforts to make Babbit sympathetic, he is a charicature. In my mid-forties, I've known many businessmen, seen many unexamined lives and mid-life crises. Even 80 years after Babbit was written (when conformity is less in vogue in the US) I've known many conformists.

I haven't known anyone like Babbit. It is out of character for a people person like Babbit to be *so* fond of Paul and yet blind to Paul's needs.It is out of character for him to be so protective of Paul and yet so estranged from his own children.

Enjoy the book and let it remind you to think for yourself and to be real, but don't let it convince you that businessmen are doomed to conformity and to sacrifice of all their ideals. To be good at business is to weild power and though we don't see it ni "Babbit", that power can be used for good. Babbit is almost as much a charicature as are Ayn Rand's businessmen heroes.

Incidentally, as good as this was, I thought Lewis' "Arrowsmith" was better. ... Read more

Product Description
SINCLAIR LEWIS
Sinclair Lewis, the well-known author and writer, was born on February 7, 1885, in Sauk Centre, Minnesota. Sinclair Lewis and his niece took a tour of the FBI Office on October 24, 1939. Sinclair Lewis's second wife was the well-known columnist, Dorothy Thompson.


... Read more