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Arrowsmith
Arrowsmith is often described as the first "scientific" novel. The books explores medical and scientific themes in a fictional way and it is difficult to think of an earlier book that does this. Although he was not a doctor, Sinclair Lewis's father was and he was greatly helped in the preparation of the manuscript by the science writer Paul de Kruif. It was de Kruif who brings a reality to the book that is almost biographical.
This reality means that the books heralds the real impact of advances in drugs, public health, and immunology that were about to change the world. It also satirises those medical and scientific practitioners whose pursuit of fame and fortune, at the expense of truth, remains just as pertinent today.
The book was first published in 1925 and was a popular and commercial success. It was awarded a Pulitzer Prize in 1926 which was refused by Sinclair Lewis. He was later to win the Nobel Prize for Literature—which he accepted.
This reality means that the books heralds the real impact of advances in drugs, public health, and immunology that were about to change the world. It also satirises those medical and scientific practitioners whose pursuit of fame and fortune, at the expense of truth, remains just as pertinent today.
The book was first published in 1925 and was a popular and commercial success. It was awarded a Pulitzer Prize in 1926 which was refused by Sinclair Lewis. He was later to win the Nobel Prize for Literature—which he accepted.
428 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1925
About the author
Sinclair Lewis
453 books959 followersNovelist Harry Sinclair Lewis satirized middle-class America in his 22 works, including
Babbitt
(1922) and
Elmer Gantry
(1927) and first received a Nobel Prize for literature in 1930.
Middle-class values and materialism attach unthinking George F. Babbitt, the narrow-minded, self-satisfied main character person in the novel of Sinclair Lewis.
People awarded "his vigorous and graphic art of description and his ability to create, with wit and humor, new types of characters."
He knowingly, insightfully, and critically viewed capitalism and materialism between the wars. People respect his strong characterizations of modern women.
Henry Louis Mencken wrote, "[If] there was ever a novelist among us with an authentic call to the trade...it is this red-haired tornado from the Minnesota wilds."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinclai...
Middle-class values and materialism attach unthinking George F. Babbitt, the narrow-minded, self-satisfied main character person in the novel of Sinclair Lewis.
People awarded "his vigorous and graphic art of description and his ability to create, with wit and humor, new types of characters."
He knowingly, insightfully, and critically viewed capitalism and materialism between the wars. People respect his strong characterizations of modern women.
Henry Louis Mencken wrote, "[If] there was ever a novelist among us with an authentic call to the trade...it is this red-haired tornado from the Minnesota wilds."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinclai...
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 587 reviews
July 20, 2023
A Novel in which the writer analyses the adverse effects of mercantilist zeal on the man of science.
We can thus reveal, in the discursive fabric of the text, an apology for the values of the spirit, practically dying in a society in which everything becomes a tradable good. Nevertheless, the novel structure shows the protagonist's moral integrity and dignity, giving the story an aura of idealism not achieved in the author's previous works.
We can thus reveal, in the discursive fabric of the text, an apology for the values of the spirit, practically dying in a society in which everything becomes a tradable good. Nevertheless, the novel structure shows the protagonist's moral integrity and dignity, giving the story an aura of idealism not achieved in the author's previous works.
April 27, 2020
Aunque en la contraportada se resalta todo lo relacionado con la investigación, la medicina, las compañías farmacéuticas, la novela es más que eso, mucho más. Sinclair nos habla de sueños, de ambiciones, de principios, de fracasos reales y de fracasos que no son tales. De la vida, en definitiva. No obstante, también es cierto que una parte no desdeñable de la novela se centra en la denuncia de ciertas prácticas de la industria de la medicina y eso me interesó bastante menos.
March 13, 2021
One could look at Arrowsmith as an outdated book from nearly 100 years ago for which its author refused the prestigious Pulitzer Prize in 1926, but one would be missing something important in this reader's opinion.
This was a great novel where Sinclair Lewis explored the world of medicine and politics via his character Martin Arrowsmith and his mentor Max Gottlieb. I have almost no connections with the mysterious world of medical schools and so forth, and I never liked hospital TV such as Gray's Anatomy or General Hospital, but thanks to the meticulous descriptions of Lewis, the reader is drawn into this world of ambition and power, into the contradictions of public and private research, into the obsession over an idea. One wonders whether the writers of some of those modern-era operating room drama shows didn't dip occasionally into the deep font of Arrowsmith for plot inspiration.
I am going to go out on a limb here and say that I think that Martin Arrowsmith might be the first gay or at least bi-sexual protagonist of a Pulitzer-winning novel. Besides his ham-handed antics of forcing a meeting of his official fiancée and his lover with predictably catastrophic results and his numerous infidelities, he never seems to deeply love any woman in his life. He would protest that he loved Leora, but he was married to work far more than to her. The ending of the book also has a very homoerotic feel to it when
Another point that bears mentioning and that brings this novel from a previous age into stark contemporary relevance is its treatment of the bubonic plague and Martin's particular Pyhrric role in fighting it. After over a year of COVID, I don't think I need to expand on the relevance here...
So, if you are not yet a Sinclair Lewis fan, perhaps skip Carrie's failed reformism of Main Street and the vacuous world of salesman like Babbitt and go right to Arrowsmith. My next read is Elmer Gantry and I am finding myself drawn even more to its adorably disgusting protagonist!
My rating of all the Pulitzer Winners: https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...
This was a great novel where Sinclair Lewis explored the world of medicine and politics via his character Martin Arrowsmith and his mentor Max Gottlieb. I have almost no connections with the mysterious world of medical schools and so forth, and I never liked hospital TV such as Gray's Anatomy or General Hospital, but thanks to the meticulous descriptions of Lewis, the reader is drawn into this world of ambition and power, into the contradictions of public and private research, into the obsession over an idea. One wonders whether the writers of some of those modern-era operating room drama shows didn't dip occasionally into the deep font of Arrowsmith for plot inspiration.
I am going to go out on a limb here and say that I think that Martin Arrowsmith might be the first gay or at least bi-sexual protagonist of a Pulitzer-winning novel. Besides his ham-handed antics of forcing a meeting of his official fiancée and his lover with predictably catastrophic results and his numerous infidelities, he never seems to deeply love any woman in his life. He would protest that he loved Leora, but he was married to work far more than to her. The ending of the book also has a very homoerotic feel to it when
Another point that bears mentioning and that brings this novel from a previous age into stark contemporary relevance is its treatment of the bubonic plague and Martin's particular Pyhrric role in fighting it. After over a year of COVID, I don't think I need to expand on the relevance here...
So, if you are not yet a Sinclair Lewis fan, perhaps skip Carrie's failed reformism of Main Street and the vacuous world of salesman like Babbitt and go right to Arrowsmith. My next read is Elmer Gantry and I am finding myself drawn even more to its adorably disgusting protagonist!
My rating of all the Pulitzer Winners: https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...
December 31, 2021
Sinclair Lewis refused to accept the Pulitzer Prize for this extraordinary novel, but don't refuse the opportunity to read it. Lewis writes with devastating precision, creativity, and wicked humor, while skewering the abundant egotism, vanity, greed and self-aggrandizement he finds in his fellow human beings.
This novel follows Dr. Martin Arrowsmith from small Midwest town (the setting of most of Lewis' works) in "medic" school through his career, during which he is constantly challenged to balance the ideals he learned as a scientific researcher to pursue "truth," with the pressures of the healthcare market.
Arrowsmith absorbed the philosophy of Professor Max Gottlieb, a slightly mysterious, arrogant German-Jewish researcher who intimidates and ridicules most of his students as unworthy of his attention, but who prizes "going slow" to ensure lab results are iron-proof before publishing results. The shadow of Max Gottlieb hangs over Martin Arrowsmith as he discovers the harsher realities of life as a small country doctor, and later, the political realities of working in a public health department under a man more dedicated to finding a way to Congress than to doing his job.
When Arrowsmith later works as a medical researcher for a company trying to fast-track medicines and cosmetic wonders to market, he is told it's "old-fashioned" and parochial to withhold publishing, because they live in an age of commerce and competition. Martin is outraged: "He preached to himself, as Max Gottlieb had once preached to him, the loyalty of dissent, the faith of being very doubtful, the gospel of now bawling gospels, the wisdom of admitting the probable ignorance of one's self and of everybody else, and the energetic acceleration of a Movement for going very slow."
The stakes for Arrowsmith's philosophy become grave when he is asked to go to the Caribbean to help with an outbreak of plague. There, his training to use controls in his experiments and "not to hurry" any inoculation before its time clashes with the grim reality of people dying by the score each day on the Island. Arrowsmith struggles to do what's right, wrestling constantly with Gottlieb's standard of total scientific purity versus saving those he can.
Written in 1925, this novel is still amazingly current as a look at human nature, the world of health care, and the forces that can corrupt both.
This novel follows Dr. Martin Arrowsmith from small Midwest town (the setting of most of Lewis' works) in "medic" school through his career, during which he is constantly challenged to balance the ideals he learned as a scientific researcher to pursue "truth," with the pressures of the healthcare market.
Arrowsmith absorbed the philosophy of Professor Max Gottlieb, a slightly mysterious, arrogant German-Jewish researcher who intimidates and ridicules most of his students as unworthy of his attention, but who prizes "going slow" to ensure lab results are iron-proof before publishing results. The shadow of Max Gottlieb hangs over Martin Arrowsmith as he discovers the harsher realities of life as a small country doctor, and later, the political realities of working in a public health department under a man more dedicated to finding a way to Congress than to doing his job.
When Arrowsmith later works as a medical researcher for a company trying to fast-track medicines and cosmetic wonders to market, he is told it's "old-fashioned" and parochial to withhold publishing, because they live in an age of commerce and competition. Martin is outraged: "He preached to himself, as Max Gottlieb had once preached to him, the loyalty of dissent, the faith of being very doubtful, the gospel of now bawling gospels, the wisdom of admitting the probable ignorance of one's self and of everybody else, and the energetic acceleration of a Movement for going very slow."
The stakes for Arrowsmith's philosophy become grave when he is asked to go to the Caribbean to help with an outbreak of plague. There, his training to use controls in his experiments and "not to hurry" any inoculation before its time clashes with the grim reality of people dying by the score each day on the Island. Arrowsmith struggles to do what's right, wrestling constantly with Gottlieb's standard of total scientific purity versus saving those he can.
Written in 1925, this novel is still amazingly current as a look at human nature, the world of health care, and the forces that can corrupt both.
August 23, 2014
I feel like I should be given a reward for making it through this, one of the most boring novels I've ever read. Maybe a coupon for a free pair of shoes, or a fruit basket. Every page was sheer torture. No plot point, no character, no line of dialogue, was interesting. Not one sentence glimmered or sparkled with the suggestion: this writer is prizeworthy.
When you consider two other American works published this same year that could have won the Pulitzer - The Great Gatsby and An American Tragedy - the mind does boggle just a bit.
I was going to give the book two stars out of deference to the Nobel Prize. But then in the final pages Arrowsmith .
April 9, 2020
For me, this book was a major disappointment. Love Sinclair Lewis, heck I named my dog Babbitt in honor of his book by the same name. But Arrowsmith left me cold. It won the Pulitzer Prize and for what reason I cannot tell. I, personally, think it as for his body of work instead of this individual book.
To me the book should have been titled, Arrowsmith: A Good Life Wasted. The book has one redeeming character, Arrowsmith's wife, Leora, who sticks with him through good and bad, and always is at home to lend an ear or a shoulder for him to rest upon. Throughout this book Arrowsmith cannot make up his mind as to his life, his career, and so many other things. He is the King of wishy-washy and moves his wife all over the country as his quest for what he really wants to do with life changes again and again. Arrowsmith is a doctor, but really wants to be a immunologist, but did not have the qualifications in chemistry or math to really do the job properly. He moves from family doctor, to lab technician, to other jobs as he goes across the US. He crosses paths with many whom he believes are fools but all of whom do extremely well and become influential, and meanwhile Martin Arrowsmith lives on a measly salary and spends days in his lab doing tests to find cures for diseases, but once found he does not publish his results, and wants to study for the sake of purity of discovery, not realizing that his discoveries could help his employees pay his salary with the profits from the anti-bodies he works on. Same thing with love, he loves Leora but is always looking at other women and goes back and forth to the point of being ridiculous.
Will end up rating this 2.5 and that is only due to Lewis' ability to make me want to continue to read about a man of whom I have no desire to know or befriend. Not a fast moving book and filled with typical Boosterism language that befits the 1920's. The only redeeming part for me with a brief one-page cameo made by George Babbitt which made me long for Lewis' previous works.
To me the book should have been titled, Arrowsmith: A Good Life Wasted. The book has one redeeming character, Arrowsmith's wife, Leora, who sticks with him through good and bad, and always is at home to lend an ear or a shoulder for him to rest upon. Throughout this book Arrowsmith cannot make up his mind as to his life, his career, and so many other things. He is the King of wishy-washy and moves his wife all over the country as his quest for what he really wants to do with life changes again and again. Arrowsmith is a doctor, but really wants to be a immunologist, but did not have the qualifications in chemistry or math to really do the job properly. He moves from family doctor, to lab technician, to other jobs as he goes across the US. He crosses paths with many whom he believes are fools but all of whom do extremely well and become influential, and meanwhile Martin Arrowsmith lives on a measly salary and spends days in his lab doing tests to find cures for diseases, but once found he does not publish his results, and wants to study for the sake of purity of discovery, not realizing that his discoveries could help his employees pay his salary with the profits from the anti-bodies he works on. Same thing with love, he loves Leora but is always looking at other women and goes back and forth to the point of being ridiculous.
Will end up rating this 2.5 and that is only due to Lewis' ability to make me want to continue to read about a man of whom I have no desire to know or befriend. Not a fast moving book and filled with typical Boosterism language that befits the 1920's. The only redeeming part for me with a brief one-page cameo made by George Babbitt which made me long for Lewis' previous works.
October 5, 2019
Humans as a species were never intended to live in our mass groupings of modern times. Not only are we too belligerent and crewel to one another, but our own biology serves to kill each other off. The only thing that has saved us from ourselves, that has provided us with some breathing room and has allowed us the space to mentally subdue the dangers of the crowd, is science. And by science, I really mean to say truth. The absolute kind of truth that serves as an absolute rock in a world largely devoid of such solid and immovable objects.
As with the other Sinclair Lewis novels that I’ve read, Arrowsmith covers a broad span of years in the life of its main character, Martin Arrowsmith. It’s a life that touches the heart of my own life in that Martin has a love for the truth. He wants to know things, but he wants to know them with certainty.
As a young disciple of the truth, Martin turns to science, or the common outlet for science: medicine. He searches for truth throughout his long career as a doctor and constantly runs into its compromised existence. He finds that truth is constantly assailed by all the forces that comprise humanity. Things like friendship, love, greed, jealousy, and compassion serve to dilute the substance of pure truth and serve to render it inept. Martin also finds that actual control over society is often contrived from this diluted form of truth.
Along the way, however, Martin meets the love of his life and her name is Leora. In many ways, Leora is the human embodiment of truth, which is why I found her so endearing as a character. Even though her presence is something of a side note to Martin’s life, she offers a glimpse into what a useful and meaningful truth in society could ultimately look like: absolute fact blended with an imperfect humanity but tempered with reason. But getting to that sort of future will only be possible if we can all bring ourselves to care about the truth, and know what the truth is, in this imperfect world.
As with the other Sinclair Lewis novels that I’ve read, Arrowsmith covers a broad span of years in the life of its main character, Martin Arrowsmith. It’s a life that touches the heart of my own life in that Martin has a love for the truth. He wants to know things, but he wants to know them with certainty.
As a young disciple of the truth, Martin turns to science, or the common outlet for science: medicine. He searches for truth throughout his long career as a doctor and constantly runs into its compromised existence. He finds that truth is constantly assailed by all the forces that comprise humanity. Things like friendship, love, greed, jealousy, and compassion serve to dilute the substance of pure truth and serve to render it inept. Martin also finds that actual control over society is often contrived from this diluted form of truth.
Along the way, however, Martin meets the love of his life and her name is Leora. In many ways, Leora is the human embodiment of truth, which is why I found her so endearing as a character. Even though her presence is something of a side note to Martin’s life, she offers a glimpse into what a useful and meaningful truth in society could ultimately look like: absolute fact blended with an imperfect humanity but tempered with reason. But getting to that sort of future will only be possible if we can all bring ourselves to care about the truth, and know what the truth is, in this imperfect world.
September 20, 2020
What a premise for a book: A young man falls in love, not just with a young woman, but with a quest. This is the passion that infuses Arrowsmith. How the author was able to put blood into such an idea explains in part the Pulitzer prize.
The other part that explains the award is that the book is a good read. Covering the nearly 20 years during which a student (and later researcher) learns to embrace his life's calling, the plot never stalls. The constant motion guides us along with Martin Arrowsmith as he follows the thread leading him out of a labyrinth of false promises, and up upon his own personal road less traveled by.
During my reading, I couldn't help comparing the book to The Fountainhead, a book with a similar moral and strikingly similar plot elements. The notion of man as a hero who overcomes constant adversity drives the action in both stories. But Arrowsmith, published some 20 years before, is the better book. One difference is that the later book presents us with a young hero having a fully developed moral sense to start with, and with our book here we see, to better effect, how a man becomes a heroic figure in the first place -- how he learns which choices really matter. Another point of contrast lies in the role of capitalism, which helps the protagonist in The Fountainhead but hampers Martin in his own search for creative freedom. Either way, the effective status of the free market plays a crucial role in both books.
In further contrast, one finds in Martin a callow lad vulnerable to poor judgment, a flaw that elicits an indulgent sympathy. This high-strung fellow with a slightly nerdy disposition, black hair on pale skin and "dreamy" eyes, yaps away with an impossible "awe shucks" Midwestern affectation. His voice sometimes hits an jarringly piercing note; at other points his brusque rudeness abrades. Testy frustration at times pushes him to overwrought tears. And does his own self-discovery, in the end, arrive at the expense of a family member? Proneness to error makes up the bread and butter of the plot.
Rare for a novel, the scientific method is a theme, for Martin's self-actualization depends on it. The necessity of controls in a solid experiment and the need for uninterrupted research factor into the story. The corrupting power of commerce and personal popularity is a danger in which the young doctor finds himself entangled again and again. Like him, we find ourselves even today grappling with the effect that the profit motive exerts on clinical research.
Let's not think that a man turned so inward ends up entirely alone. But again, we find Martin's affections becoming psychological, possibly even at the expense of the sexual and familial. For such as he, the attraction of the mental bond two people can forge is a discovery that sets his psychic makeup apart from the crowd.
To this book, with its distinctive Midwestern tang, I gave a high rating. I recommend it for readers who are looking for an unlikely subject and an unusual hero, a protagonist pushing against a riptide toward unexpected contentment.
The other part that explains the award is that the book is a good read. Covering the nearly 20 years during which a student (and later researcher) learns to embrace his life's calling, the plot never stalls. The constant motion guides us along with Martin Arrowsmith as he follows the thread leading him out of a labyrinth of false promises, and up upon his own personal road less traveled by.
During my reading, I couldn't help comparing the book to The Fountainhead, a book with a similar moral and strikingly similar plot elements. The notion of man as a hero who overcomes constant adversity drives the action in both stories. But Arrowsmith, published some 20 years before, is the better book. One difference is that the later book presents us with a young hero having a fully developed moral sense to start with, and with our book here we see, to better effect, how a man becomes a heroic figure in the first place -- how he learns which choices really matter. Another point of contrast lies in the role of capitalism, which helps the protagonist in The Fountainhead but hampers Martin in his own search for creative freedom. Either way, the effective status of the free market plays a crucial role in both books.
In further contrast, one finds in Martin a callow lad vulnerable to poor judgment, a flaw that elicits an indulgent sympathy. This high-strung fellow with a slightly nerdy disposition, black hair on pale skin and "dreamy" eyes, yaps away with an impossible "awe shucks" Midwestern affectation. His voice sometimes hits an jarringly piercing note; at other points his brusque rudeness abrades. Testy frustration at times pushes him to overwrought tears. And does his own self-discovery, in the end, arrive at the expense of a family member? Proneness to error makes up the bread and butter of the plot.
Rare for a novel, the scientific method is a theme, for Martin's self-actualization depends on it. The necessity of controls in a solid experiment and the need for uninterrupted research factor into the story. The corrupting power of commerce and personal popularity is a danger in which the young doctor finds himself entangled again and again. Like him, we find ourselves even today grappling with the effect that the profit motive exerts on clinical research.
Let's not think that a man turned so inward ends up entirely alone. But again, we find Martin's affections becoming psychological, possibly even at the expense of the sexual and familial. For such as he, the attraction of the mental bond two people can forge is a discovery that sets his psychic makeup apart from the crowd.
To this book, with its distinctive Midwestern tang, I gave a high rating. I recommend it for readers who are looking for an unlikely subject and an unusual hero, a protagonist pushing against a riptide toward unexpected contentment.
August 3, 2018
3.5 stars, rounded down.
To truly appreciate Arrowsmith, you must appreciate satire, because much of this book is written a bit tongue in cheek. Martin Arrowsmith is a man who aspires to be a pure scientist, and struggles to do so in the face of commercialism, hubris and ambition. I must confess to not liking Martin universally. He is pompous at times, and he is cold and unfeeling at others. I wanted him to find a better balance between his dedication to his work and his personal relationships, particularly the one he shared with his wife, Leora.
I was struck with how little has changed in our society over the century that lies between the publication of this novel and our own day. Martin Arrowsmith is a physician, but one who cares little for the practice of medicine and is much more involved with the research of disease. With our current struggle with how to best provide health care for the masses, I could see so many of the questions were the same in 1920. Do you rush to market with an inoculation that has not been completely proved or do you continue your research until you are satisfied there can be no error, risking the deaths of infected people and the chance that someone else will beat you to the market with their own serum? What is the purpose of the independent research laboratory--the production of discovery useful to the population or the making of profits for the shareholders? What about the charming but ignorant, or worse, morally corrupt, men who are running things, making the decisions, choosing the direction?
While I found this to be well-written and its message meaningful, there was a missing element for me, and that was emotional involvement. I found that the further into the story I got the more emotionally divorced I felt. I could not muster a tear when the events in the story might have merited one, nor could I feel the injustice or frustration, although I recognized it and chronicled it. I was very much looking forward to reading this, and I felt a bit deflated when I closed the last page.
Don’t misunderstand, I am not suggesting it isn’t worth the reading, it just didn’t live up to my expectations.
To truly appreciate Arrowsmith, you must appreciate satire, because much of this book is written a bit tongue in cheek. Martin Arrowsmith is a man who aspires to be a pure scientist, and struggles to do so in the face of commercialism, hubris and ambition. I must confess to not liking Martin universally. He is pompous at times, and he is cold and unfeeling at others. I wanted him to find a better balance between his dedication to his work and his personal relationships, particularly the one he shared with his wife, Leora.
I was struck with how little has changed in our society over the century that lies between the publication of this novel and our own day. Martin Arrowsmith is a physician, but one who cares little for the practice of medicine and is much more involved with the research of disease. With our current struggle with how to best provide health care for the masses, I could see so many of the questions were the same in 1920. Do you rush to market with an inoculation that has not been completely proved or do you continue your research until you are satisfied there can be no error, risking the deaths of infected people and the chance that someone else will beat you to the market with their own serum? What is the purpose of the independent research laboratory--the production of discovery useful to the population or the making of profits for the shareholders? What about the charming but ignorant, or worse, morally corrupt, men who are running things, making the decisions, choosing the direction?
While I found this to be well-written and its message meaningful, there was a missing element for me, and that was emotional involvement. I found that the further into the story I got the more emotionally divorced I felt. I could not muster a tear when the events in the story might have merited one, nor could I feel the injustice or frustration, although I recognized it and chronicled it. I was very much looking forward to reading this, and I felt a bit deflated when I closed the last page.
Don’t misunderstand, I am not suggesting it isn’t worth the reading, it just didn’t live up to my expectations.
October 3, 2020
PT/ENG
.
O Doutor Arrowsmith, de Sinclair Lewis.
Li Babbitt na adolescência, e apesar de ter adorado o livro, nunca mais regressara a Sinclair Lewis. Uma lástima, porque Lewis foi sem dúvida um grande autor. Este Arrowsmith é um misto de sátira com grande romance americano, ao qual não faltam abundantes críticas à sociedade mercantil e bajuladora, e revi-me em muitas das lutas de Martin. Jocoso e sempre interessante, nem a tradução medíocre, adaptada do português brasileiro e cheia de gralhas, lhe tirou o mérito. Brilhante.
.
Arrowsmith, by Sinclair Lewis.
I read Babbitt when I was a teen, and though I loved it, I hadn't returned to Lewis's work until now. A shame, as Lewis was indeed a great writer. Arrowsmith is a satyrical great American novel with abundant and fierce critics to the mercantilistic, hypocritical modern society. I could relate to many of Martin's struggles.
This old translation into Portuguese is quite mediocre, but it didn't shade any of the novel's brilliant qualities.
.
O Doutor Arrowsmith, de Sinclair Lewis.
Li Babbitt na adolescência, e apesar de ter adorado o livro, nunca mais regressara a Sinclair Lewis. Uma lástima, porque Lewis foi sem dúvida um grande autor. Este Arrowsmith é um misto de sátira com grande romance americano, ao qual não faltam abundantes críticas à sociedade mercantil e bajuladora, e revi-me em muitas das lutas de Martin. Jocoso e sempre interessante, nem a tradução medíocre, adaptada do português brasileiro e cheia de gralhas, lhe tirou o mérito. Brilhante.
.
Arrowsmith, by Sinclair Lewis.
I read Babbitt when I was a teen, and though I loved it, I hadn't returned to Lewis's work until now. A shame, as Lewis was indeed a great writer. Arrowsmith is a satyrical great American novel with abundant and fierce critics to the mercantilistic, hypocritical modern society. I could relate to many of Martin's struggles.
This old translation into Portuguese is quite mediocre, but it didn't shade any of the novel's brilliant qualities.
June 17, 2021
Many years ago I started Sinclair Lewis’ novel Babbitt but found myself bored and quickly put it aside. So while I wanted to give him another chance, I wasn’t really looking forward to it. At the time of that initial effort I did not know much about Sinclair Lewis, so as I began reading Arrowsmith I was surprised to learn how popular he was during much of his writing career and how successful he was in all respects. His novel Main Street was actually awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1921 by the selection committee but then the Columbia University trustees overruled that decision because Main Street did not meet the “wholesome” requirement for the award (see the story here). The selection committee, a year later, knew that for the same reason it could not recommend Babbitt for the prize. So, when Arrowsmith was awarded the Pulitzer in 1926, Lewis refused the prize. What is more significant, though, is that Sinclair Lewis had three very popular novels considered for the Pulitzer over a five-year span. Despite winning the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1930, Sinclair Lewis was for many years lost in the turbulence created by such American greats as Fitzgerald, Hemingway and Faulkner, but has resurfaced with the recent interest in his novel It Can’t Happen Here.
Arrowsmith is the story of a man torn between a financially rewarding career along with the associated recognition and his love for pure science. In the process of making up his mind Martin Arrowsmith loses his first wife and forfeits his second. I was surprised at how relevant the story felt to when I was beginning my career and how relevant it feels to the choices young women and men must make today. While there is nothing unique or even noteworthy about the style of Lewis’ prose nor does he use any creative narrative structures, he tells a good story and tells it in a way that is easily read. Moreover, his characters feel real. They have real problems to which I could relate. Most importantly, he describes an America that we can only know today through a writer with his insight.
I think I see more Sinclair Lewis in my future. Maybe Main Street.
Arrowsmith is the story of a man torn between a financially rewarding career along with the associated recognition and his love for pure science. In the process of making up his mind Martin Arrowsmith loses his first wife and forfeits his second. I was surprised at how relevant the story felt to when I was beginning my career and how relevant it feels to the choices young women and men must make today. While there is nothing unique or even noteworthy about the style of Lewis’ prose nor does he use any creative narrative structures, he tells a good story and tells it in a way that is easily read. Moreover, his characters feel real. They have real problems to which I could relate. Most importantly, he describes an America that we can only know today through a writer with his insight.
I think I see more Sinclair Lewis in my future. Maybe Main Street.
March 13, 2018
Small town doctor scales the heights of the scientific community. Pulitzer Prize winner.
... and then there's also
they could rock, but they couldn't spell
update: I'm abashed to say now that I will need to reacquire the book, since, having read Main Street, I hope to read/re-read all his best novels, of which Arrowsmith is one.
I am sorry to admit that this is one of thetwo three books I've read by Lewis, especially so since I grew up about 30 miles from Sauk Centre Minnesota, where he was born and raised. (The other book by him that I've read is It Can't Happen Here, which unfortunately seems more plausibly prophetic as time goes on.)
Perhaps I willhave the opportunity to read other of read all his great novels in the years ahead, here's hoping.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Previous review: Another World
Recent review: Seven Against Thebes
Next review: Boswell's Presumptuous Task
Previous library review: It Can't Happen Here
Next library review: Main Street
... and then there's also
they could rock, but they couldn't spell
update: I'm abashed to say now that I will need to reacquire the book, since, having read Main Street, I hope to read/re-read all his best novels, of which Arrowsmith is one.
I am sorry to admit that this is one of the
Perhaps I will
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Previous review: Another World
Recent review: Seven Against Thebes
Next review: Boswell's Presumptuous Task
Previous library review: It Can't Happen Here
Next library review: Main Street
May 31, 2021
Me he dormido las últimas cuatro noches que he intentado ponerle fin, de hoy con dos cafés no podía pasar.
He encontrado en Martin Arrowsmith y sus altibajos laborales y emocionales gran parte de mí, y creo que es algo que le ocurrirá a cualquier persona con una gran vocación hacia su trabajo.
Las horas, las dudas, el tiempo lejos de los tuyos (que pesa más bien por ellos), el devenir profesional al margen de sueldos, las zancadillas de jefes y colegas aprovechados, la camaradería cuando se encuentran personas afines, la eterna frustración, el altísimo precio que se paga a veces y las miles de recompensas que nadie más ve... la novela tiene muchísimo contenido y daría para horas de debate.
Lo mejor, lo más auténtico, son los personajes con mucha diferencia. Incluso los secundarios son perfectamente visibles.
Lo peor: Me encantaron los primeros tres cuartos, pero el último se me hizo excesivamente largo y pesado, aunque tenga un buen final. Después de la epidemia pierde mucho fuelle, y la trama con Joyce se estira como un chicle.
He encontrado en Martin Arrowsmith y sus altibajos laborales y emocionales gran parte de mí, y creo que es algo que le ocurrirá a cualquier persona con una gran vocación hacia su trabajo.
"Con la misma atención y exactamente del mismo modo impersonal que habría observado cómo un conejillo de indias infectado desarrollaba progresivamente la enfermedad, Martin se observaba a sí mismo, en la locura del exceso de trabajo, encaminándose hacia la neurastenia. Investigó con considerable interés los síntomas de este mal, viendo que se daban en él uno tras otro, y continuó sin cambiar de conducta, asumiendo el riesgo despreocupadamente."
Las horas, las dudas, el tiempo lejos de los tuyos (que pesa más bien por ellos), el devenir profesional al margen de sueldos, las zancadillas de jefes y colegas aprovechados, la camaradería cuando se encuentran personas afines, la eterna frustración, el altísimo precio que se paga a veces y las miles de recompensas que nadie más ve... la novela tiene muchísimo contenido y daría para horas de debate.
Lo mejor, lo más auténtico, son los personajes con mucha diferencia. Incluso los secundarios son perfectamente visibles.
Lo peor: Me encantaron los primeros tres cuartos, pero el último se me hizo excesivamente largo y pesado, aunque tenga un buen final. Después de la epidemia pierde mucho fuelle, y la trama con Joyce se estira como un chicle.
January 28, 2023
Sinclair Lewis's Arrowsmith is more expansive and grandiose than his standard work, though it pulsates with his usual cynical themes. The book is a cradle-to-middle-age chronicle of an idealistic doctor, Martin Arrowsmith, who grows from a Midwestern medical student to one of the best-known physicians in the world. Encouraged by his mentor to focus on pure research, he craves social advancement and winds up recruited by a politically ambitious health official to work as a small town physician. From there, his idealism wrestles with his ambition and vices (he is a flagrant womanizer with a fondness for drink) until, in the climactic chapters, he is dispatched to the West Indies to stop a raging epidemic on a small island. Lewis's book contains heavy amounts of scientific detail on medicine and bacteriology (enough that he credits biologist Paul de Kruuf as a virtual co-author), which provides credibility but also dry passages that slow the narrative down. Similarly, the scenes of Martin’s marital woes feel a bit overdone, with Lewis reaching for an earnestness that doesn't come naturally to him. The central conflict is well-rendered though, containing the cynicism that animates Lewis's other work: the book sparkles in scenes depicting Arrowsmith's feuds with ignorant boosters and arrogant senior doctors, along with a brilliant vignette at a bogus "health fair" whose main attraction is a "Eugenically Pure" family which bribes the judges to win its prize. The book retains a glimmer of idealism usually missing from Lewis's work; it offers the possibility that Arrowsmith, for all his setbacks and compromises, can still achieve good through his medical practice. And for an author with such a caustic view of human nature, that's practically a feel-good ending. Adapted into a well-known in its time, though largely forgotten film by John Ford in 1931, though Ford's version significantly pares down Lewis's storyline into a straightforward melodrama.
June 30, 2022
৪.৫/৫
এরোস্মিথকে "adult coming of age story" বলা যায়।প্রায় এক শতাব্দী আগের মার্কিন চিকিৎসা ও সমাজব্যবস্থার প্রামাণ্য দলিল ও সমালোচক এই উপন্যাস।
নায়ক মার্টিন এরোস্মিথের প্রেমপর্ব, জীবনের প্রস্তুতিপর্ব,দাম্পত্যপর্ব ও পেশাগত ক্ষেত্রে সংকটপর্ব নিয়ে এগোনো গল্পটিতে হাস্যরস ও করুণরসের যুগপৎ সহাবস্থান পাঠকের মনে বিচিত্র সব অনুভূতির সৃষ্টি করে। এরোস্মিথের মধ্যে আমরা নিজেকে খুঁজে পাই।জীবনের দুরূহতম কাজ নাকি দুইটা-
১.কোথা থেকে শুরু করতে হবে,
২.কোথায় যেয়ে থামতে হবে।
এরোস্মিথ যে বয়সে নিজেকে ফিরে পেতে শুরু করেছে, সে বয়সের ধারেকাছে এসে নিজের দিকে তাকালে মনে হয় আমি এখনো শুরুই করতে পারি নি। সব বাঁধা বিপত্তি অন্তর্দ্বন্দ্ব পেরিয়ে, আমিও স্বধর্মে স্থিত হতে পারবো একদিন; অন্তত আশা করতে তো দোষ নেই!!
(১০ জুন, ২০২২)
এরোস্মিথকে "adult coming of age story" বলা যায়।প্রায় এক শতাব্দী আগের মার্কিন চিকিৎসা ও সমাজব্যবস্থার প্রামাণ্য দলিল ও সমালোচক এই উপন্যাস।
নায়ক মার্টিন এরোস্মিথের প্রেমপর্ব, জীবনের প্রস্তুতিপর্ব,দাম্পত্যপর্ব ও পেশাগত ক্ষেত্রে সংকটপর্ব নিয়ে এগোনো গল্পটিতে হাস্যরস ও করুণরসের যুগপৎ সহাবস্থান পাঠকের মনে বিচিত্র সব অনুভূতির সৃষ্টি করে। এরোস্মিথের মধ্যে আমরা নিজেকে খুঁজে পাই।জীবনের দুরূহতম কাজ নাকি দুইটা-
১.কোথা থেকে শুরু করতে হবে,
২.কোথায় যেয়ে থামতে হবে।
এরোস্মিথ যে বয়সে নিজেকে ফিরে পেতে শুরু করেছে, সে বয়সের ধারেকাছে এসে নিজের দিকে তাকালে মনে হয় আমি এখনো শুরুই করতে পারি নি। সব বাঁধা বিপত্তি অন্তর্দ্বন্দ্ব পেরিয়ে, আমিও স্বধর্মে স্থিত হতে পারবো একদিন; অন্তত আশা করতে তো দোষ নেই!!
(১০ জুন, ২০২২)
July 26, 2016
First of all let me state, I preferred Main Street. This was a disappointment even if it started out good.
I do like the clever lines filled with sardonic humor, but they wore thin after a while. You must listen carefully or you may not catch the implied criticism.
The book is too long, and it is repetitive. A message is delivered, but that message is said over and over again. The central focus is upon those in the medical profession. The author is stating that many are than in either caring for their patient or, if they have chosen to do research, their quest for new knowledge. It is a question of where their heart lies. That is it; that is the message which is drilled in over and over again. One cutting remark is amusing, a few makes the author’s point clear, but over and over again it just becomes boring.
Martin Arowsmith wavers; he doesn't know where his real interest lies. Practitioner or research scientist? That is what he must decide. And the end? Well, I am certainly not going to tell you what he decides, but it takes him forever to figure out where his true interest lies.
I am one who wants realism. Most people do make compromises. We have ideals but rarely do we follow them absolutely through to the end. I felt the book portrayed characters as caricatures, too much as black versus white, good versus bad. I felt the book pushed the central question to an extreme.
The narration by John McDonough was superb. Perfect speed. You hear the humor. A total pleasure to listen to; it is not his fault I didn't appreciate the book's content.
It is interesting to note that Sinclair Lewis' parents and grandparents werephysicians.
I do like the clever lines filled with sardonic humor, but they wore thin after a while. You must listen carefully or you may not catch the implied criticism.
The book is too long, and it is repetitive. A message is delivered, but that message is said over and over again. The central focus is upon those in the medical profession. The author is stating that many are than in either caring for their patient or, if they have chosen to do research, their quest for new knowledge. It is a question of where their heart lies. That is it; that is the message which is drilled in over and over again. One cutting remark is amusing, a few makes the author’s point clear, but over and over again it just becomes boring.
Martin Arowsmith wavers; he doesn't know where his real interest lies. Practitioner or research scientist? That is what he must decide. And the end? Well, I am certainly not going to tell you what he decides, but it takes him forever to figure out where his true interest lies.
I am one who wants realism. Most people do make compromises. We have ideals but rarely do we follow them absolutely through to the end. I felt the book portrayed characters as caricatures, too much as black versus white, good versus bad. I felt the book pushed the central question to an extreme.
The narration by John McDonough was superb. Perfect speed. You hear the humor. A total pleasure to listen to; it is not his fault I didn't appreciate the book's content.
It is interesting to note that Sinclair Lewis' parents and grandparents werephysicians.
November 18, 2022
Private practice, public policy, original scientific medical research- our protagonist Martin Arrowsmith tracks through these fields and we get to follow him.
Lewis captures the true labor, pitfalls, pratfalls and snarkiness of practitioners and observers so that it still feels fresh and modern; proof that human nature doesn’t really change.
Gottlieb’s diatribe about scientists is dead on and reminds us there are some amongst us who care about truth and reality, being authentic and having integrity in our work. Truly wonderful even if Marty ends up a wild man in the woods of Vermont.
Lewis captures the true labor, pitfalls, pratfalls and snarkiness of practitioners and observers so that it still feels fresh and modern; proof that human nature doesn’t really change.
Gottlieb’s diatribe about scientists is dead on and reminds us there are some amongst us who care about truth and reality, being authentic and having integrity in our work. Truly wonderful even if Marty ends up a wild man in the woods of Vermont.
April 13, 2020
I've been meaning to review ARROWSMITH after my second reading, when I experienced it with a group here at GR. In my opinion, this is one well-put-together realistic novel. After the satires of MAIN STREET and BABBITT, Sinclair Lewis wrote ARROWSMITH (1925), in part, to prove that he did not "lack spiritual gifts." It's also meticulously well-researched, based in no small part on the fact that Lewis's father was a "country doc" - a plain g.p. It's long and involved, but the story of how Martin Arrowsmith makes his way through every medical situation from stultifying small town through cut-throat research institute to agonizing tropical disease is finely rendered -- a little satiric, of course, but no more than it had to be. Martin Arrowsmith is never a figure of fun like, say, Elmer Gantry of George F. Babbitt: he may be naive at times, but his motives are pure. In fact, ARROWSMITH is the novel for people who have read BABBITT or ELMER GANTRY and want something with a little more teeth. It's also a fine revelation of the social history of the 1920s. Highly recommended. Not a short novel, but a most worthwhile one.
March 26, 2024
Sinclair Lewis’s Arrowsmith was something of a break through novel. It is considered the first novel to directly address science and medicine as a plot driver. It is also a character study but of a particular kind of person. Not just a scientist, or a medical practitioner, but a person with an avocation. Lewis allows us to mature with a very believable, flawed human as he acts as a common, every-man finding and facing his destiny. Martin Arrowsmith Is not an out sized hero. He is someone rather like us, but still not of us. Martin Arrowsmith is an every-man and the question is, is it in us, through him to be a hero? Arrowsmith is a recommended read for almost any audience. It can be irreverent toward religion, but there is a respect for the religious. There is no bad language and no violence. However this is perhaps too thoughtful for the young and the details of the plague can be unsettling. Do not let the medical vocabulary throw you off, Arrowsmith is something anyone can read and enjoy.
We meet Arrowsmith as a very young person, already fascinated by medicine. He is the friend of one of the local medical doctors, an otherwise broken drunkard who allows this young person to perform as a town medical man. More so than could happen in our time. Next we go with him to a remote and minimally established public college/medical school. Here his performance will vary based on the kinds of influence one could expect in a crowd of immature and unsophisticated college kids.
Among the things that make this extended introduction a superior example of writing is that the real theme is introduced and isolated in ways that will not be fully realized in any one place before the end. For example Arrowsmith spends a summer performing the hard physical labor of a lineman and enjoying this turn. That is, he is not to be criticized as too pampered to handle real work.
Arrowsmith is a modern version of Pilgrims Progress. Along the way he will find what may seem to the reader as paradise, only to have Lewis take us one step deeper where we may find we, the reader has accepted Vanity Fair over our hero’s real goal.
We meet Arrowsmith as a very young person, already fascinated by medicine. He is the friend of one of the local medical doctors, an otherwise broken drunkard who allows this young person to perform as a town medical man. More so than could happen in our time. Next we go with him to a remote and minimally established public college/medical school. Here his performance will vary based on the kinds of influence one could expect in a crowd of immature and unsophisticated college kids.
Among the things that make this extended introduction a superior example of writing is that the real theme is introduced and isolated in ways that will not be fully realized in any one place before the end. For example Arrowsmith spends a summer performing the hard physical labor of a lineman and enjoying this turn. That is, he is not to be criticized as too pampered to handle real work.
Arrowsmith is a modern version of Pilgrims Progress. Along the way he will find what may seem to the reader as paradise, only to have Lewis take us one step deeper where we may find we, the reader has accepted Vanity Fair over our hero’s real goal.
April 20, 2011
I just finished this novel earlier today. I was blown away. In her book, The Art of Fiction, Ayn Rand refers to this work by Sinclair Lewis often. She compares it to The Fountainhead a number of times, and rightly so. Martin Arrowsmith is much like Howard Roark in many ways, though Roark had more integrity. Martin seemed so much more human than Roark though. There are times that all idealists fall short from their way of life. Martin sells out a few time in this story, but it makes his character more interesting. The conflict is more "real life" than in the Fountainhead. Do not get me wrong, I also gave The Fountainhead a five star rating. I love the book. I love both of these books.
My favorite aspect of this book is the relationship between Martin and Max. I know what it is like to have such high respect for an individual; to the point where when you violate their values, you are convicted yourself. Max would be a great mentor to those who pursue individualism and idealism.
The novel is written so well and there was not a single spot that had me confused. There was a literary flow to the story. The events lined up perfectly and rendered Martin's development without flaw. I would highly recommend this book to anybody who believes in individualism and understands the fight one must engage in to achieve their personal goals.
The only problem that I had with this book was the ending. I mean, I like how the story ends, but I do not like the "summary" feel to the last few chapters. All of the events occurred so fast and it was difficult to appreciate each event. This person dies, this person marries, this person is born, this person quits his job, this person moves, etc. It just seemed that the last few chapters could have been extended a bit since Lewis was so detailed when he spoke of Martins' school experience, his time in North Dakota, and his career development. To "wrap things up" at the end almost felt like a rip-off.
Regardless of my thoughts, this book is solid, plain and simple. Read it.
My favorite aspect of this book is the relationship between Martin and Max. I know what it is like to have such high respect for an individual; to the point where when you violate their values, you are convicted yourself. Max would be a great mentor to those who pursue individualism and idealism.
The novel is written so well and there was not a single spot that had me confused. There was a literary flow to the story. The events lined up perfectly and rendered Martin's development without flaw. I would highly recommend this book to anybody who believes in individualism and understands the fight one must engage in to achieve their personal goals.
The only problem that I had with this book was the ending. I mean, I like how the story ends, but I do not like the "summary" feel to the last few chapters. All of the events occurred so fast and it was difficult to appreciate each event. This person dies, this person marries, this person is born, this person quits his job, this person moves, etc. It just seemed that the last few chapters could have been extended a bit since Lewis was so detailed when he spoke of Martins' school experience, his time in North Dakota, and his career development. To "wrap things up" at the end almost felt like a rip-off.
Regardless of my thoughts, this book is solid, plain and simple. Read it.
February 19, 2023
The title in English: Arrowsmith.
I remember reading another book by Sinclair Lewis when I was around 20 and admiring his bitter humor and precision in dissecting social problems. I need to improve my memory of book details; I believe that book to be 'Main Street.' Unfortunately, I can't say much good about Arrowsmith.
The book is Martin Arrowsmith's biography from childhood to the late middle ages, full of emotional jumps between living a comfortable life of a well-known, respected doctor and neglecting trivial comfort for pure science. Sinclair Lewis stretched the simplistic plot - a dreamy medic searching for his place in life - over a volume of more than 600 pages (in my edition). The search for life meaning is presented in the form of a circle from what Arrowsmith dreamed about as a student to his final choice of science over wealth. Along with the diffident Arrowsmith, readers see static characters, men and women, designed to emphasize the author's viewpoint. Vociferous yet stupid careerists, forgotten idealists, incompetent administrators - we all know these types. The characters pop out into the spotlight to hinder or help the main hero, and some plot twists (like Arrowsmith's marriage to a woman with an opposite worldview) seem far-stretched. The author's central thought is life's constant struggle: selfless labor for science vs. earning money or, to speak in broader terms, choosing oneself vs. serving others' interests.
The book is easy to get through due to the elegant prose and dialogues (especially at the end of the book) helping to overcome moralistic instances. As with all literary works of the time, the story contains lengthy introductions to every character, yet, as in cases of classical literature, these long passages, while not moving the plot further, do not become insurmountable obstacles.
Summarizing my observations, I conclude that I enjoyed Arrowsmith on a linguistical level but stayed unimpressed by its semantical load. After hesitating between 2 and 3 stars, I'm giving the book 2.5 stars, rounded to three.
I remember reading another book by Sinclair Lewis when I was around 20 and admiring his bitter humor and precision in dissecting social problems. I need to improve my memory of book details; I believe that book to be 'Main Street.' Unfortunately, I can't say much good about Arrowsmith.
The book is Martin Arrowsmith's biography from childhood to the late middle ages, full of emotional jumps between living a comfortable life of a well-known, respected doctor and neglecting trivial comfort for pure science. Sinclair Lewis stretched the simplistic plot - a dreamy medic searching for his place in life - over a volume of more than 600 pages (in my edition). The search for life meaning is presented in the form of a circle from what Arrowsmith dreamed about as a student to his final choice of science over wealth. Along with the diffident Arrowsmith, readers see static characters, men and women, designed to emphasize the author's viewpoint. Vociferous yet stupid careerists, forgotten idealists, incompetent administrators - we all know these types. The characters pop out into the spotlight to hinder or help the main hero, and some plot twists (like Arrowsmith's marriage to a woman with an opposite worldview) seem far-stretched. The author's central thought is life's constant struggle: selfless labor for science vs. earning money or, to speak in broader terms, choosing oneself vs. serving others' interests.
The book is easy to get through due to the elegant prose and dialogues (especially at the end of the book) helping to overcome moralistic instances. As with all literary works of the time, the story contains lengthy introductions to every character, yet, as in cases of classical literature, these long passages, while not moving the plot further, do not become insurmountable obstacles.
Summarizing my observations, I conclude that I enjoyed Arrowsmith on a linguistical level but stayed unimpressed by its semantical load. After hesitating between 2 and 3 stars, I'm giving the book 2.5 stars, rounded to three.
December 29, 2007
When I read this book, it started my love for Sinclair Lewis. He is, as far as I'm concerned, the Charles Dickens of the US. This book is about a young man who experiences disappointments and disillusionment in his life on his way to a career that he believes he wants.
July 10, 2014
I can understand why this novel was so important at the time, for it brought out the conflicts between public and private healthcare, between discovery and commercial exploitation, and between researcher and healer.
Arrowsmith, a product of rural mid-west America, is the quintessential scientist, content to shun the pleasures and riches of the world and be sequestered in his laboratory unravelling the secrets of major epidemics. Only the love of his life, Leora, who faithfully and tragically follows him on his peregrinations to find his place in the world, and who spends hours in his laboratory compiling his tests and making notes, has him pegged: “You are not a booster. You are a lie-hunter, and a hick.” Arrowsmith’s other major influence is his research professor, Gotlieb, a renowned bacteriologist and an irascible seeker of the truth at whatever human cost.
The novel is packed with incident and chronicles our hero’s life from his youth, through his university years, to his early life as a physician in mythical mid-western towns such as Wheatsylvania (pop. 367) and Nautilus (pop. 68,000), until he gives up on the role of the healer and follows pure scientific research by joining his former mentor, Gotlieb, in New York City. Arrowsmith’s brief stints and initiatives in public healthcare draw the ire of the private healthcare establishment (many of the protesters are his former frat-buddies), making this a topical book in our modern times of Obama-care. However, the world of research, with its well-stocked labs and laissez faire approach of “tooling around until you hit on something useful, even if it takes you several years,” also starts to show its ugly underbelly when Arrowsmith’s discovery of the X Principle is usurped by another within the international research fraternity.
Arrowsmith finds his ultimate challenge when he is sent to St Hubert’s in the Caribbean to put down bubonic plague with the vaccine developed through his research. With hundreds dying by the day, he faces the test of the researcher vs. the healer: does he deliberately keep a control group without giving them the vaccine so that he can document his results accurately, or does he vaccinate everyone and save more lives? His beloved Leora shows him the answer.
From the climax in St. Hubert’s (where I thought the novel should have ended) we follow Arrowsmith a bit further to his life of luxury and privilege with a new wife, Joyce, until he faces the next existential decision: does he subside into complaisance and anonymity in Joyce’s world, or does he chuck it all up again and join a renegade research colleague, Terry, in a flea-bitten lab, extending the next frontier of medical research?
The narrative style is one of brisk storytelling laced with underlying humour; much happens in the span of a few pages. The medical community, the research community, university life, and small town life are well drawn. People in small towns have “relations” as opposed to “sex” - a word or a line of dialogue explains a lot! There is however, a lot of medical and scientific terminology that can be a bit intimidating to the uninitiated – testament to Lewis’s own life lived within a family of doctors.
Yet, despite the rationality of the researcher, Arrowsmith comes across as very human, and is governed by his emotions, making him an engaging character to take this long narrative voyage with. And like an artist, he is totally self-absorbed in his pursuits, until fate intervenes to make him pause and take stock of his humanness.
Arrowsmith, a product of rural mid-west America, is the quintessential scientist, content to shun the pleasures and riches of the world and be sequestered in his laboratory unravelling the secrets of major epidemics. Only the love of his life, Leora, who faithfully and tragically follows him on his peregrinations to find his place in the world, and who spends hours in his laboratory compiling his tests and making notes, has him pegged: “You are not a booster. You are a lie-hunter, and a hick.” Arrowsmith’s other major influence is his research professor, Gotlieb, a renowned bacteriologist and an irascible seeker of the truth at whatever human cost.
The novel is packed with incident and chronicles our hero’s life from his youth, through his university years, to his early life as a physician in mythical mid-western towns such as Wheatsylvania (pop. 367) and Nautilus (pop. 68,000), until he gives up on the role of the healer and follows pure scientific research by joining his former mentor, Gotlieb, in New York City. Arrowsmith’s brief stints and initiatives in public healthcare draw the ire of the private healthcare establishment (many of the protesters are his former frat-buddies), making this a topical book in our modern times of Obama-care. However, the world of research, with its well-stocked labs and laissez faire approach of “tooling around until you hit on something useful, even if it takes you several years,” also starts to show its ugly underbelly when Arrowsmith’s discovery of the X Principle is usurped by another within the international research fraternity.
Arrowsmith finds his ultimate challenge when he is sent to St Hubert’s in the Caribbean to put down bubonic plague with the vaccine developed through his research. With hundreds dying by the day, he faces the test of the researcher vs. the healer: does he deliberately keep a control group without giving them the vaccine so that he can document his results accurately, or does he vaccinate everyone and save more lives? His beloved Leora shows him the answer.
From the climax in St. Hubert’s (where I thought the novel should have ended) we follow Arrowsmith a bit further to his life of luxury and privilege with a new wife, Joyce, until he faces the next existential decision: does he subside into complaisance and anonymity in Joyce’s world, or does he chuck it all up again and join a renegade research colleague, Terry, in a flea-bitten lab, extending the next frontier of medical research?
The narrative style is one of brisk storytelling laced with underlying humour; much happens in the span of a few pages. The medical community, the research community, university life, and small town life are well drawn. People in small towns have “relations” as opposed to “sex” - a word or a line of dialogue explains a lot! There is however, a lot of medical and scientific terminology that can be a bit intimidating to the uninitiated – testament to Lewis’s own life lived within a family of doctors.
Yet, despite the rationality of the researcher, Arrowsmith comes across as very human, and is governed by his emotions, making him an engaging character to take this long narrative voyage with. And like an artist, he is totally self-absorbed in his pursuits, until fate intervenes to make him pause and take stock of his humanness.
November 9, 2020
Martin Arrowsmith, M.D. had everything going for him and everything to figure out at the same time. The bright and scientifically minded Arrowsmith makes his way from a small town in the Midwest to the upper echelons of the scientific community with plenty of bumps along the way. For all his braininess, Martin lacks any social skills as well as any real desire to acquire them. Instead, he begins to realize his real hunger is for genuine scientific research, something still in it’s infancy in mid-1920’s America. Lewis moves him and his hapless but devoted wife into different circumstances (it almost seems) to illustrate the state and prospects of medicine in the United States of the era and to tempt, distract and deceive Arrowsmith with the attractions of financial security, recognition, even wealth and power away from his original plan to follow in the footsteps of his first mentor, Max Gottlieb, a brilliant but abrasive bacteriologist.
Although satirical and humorous, Arrowsmith also describes many aspects of medical training, practice, and ethics and scientific research, public health, and personal/professional conflicts that would seem to be as relevant today as then. I am no scientist, nor medical professional and I certainly learned a great deal about both from this book, but it seemed to me it was not just a book meant to disparage their professions, only to highlight weaknesses inherent in all professions.
Highly recommended.
Lewis won the 1926 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction this 1925 novel and its certainly worth it, yet he declined the award. In a letter to the committee, he wrote:
I say, give him the benefit of the doubt and take him at his word. Based on the stringent—even strident—integrity of his two main characters, I have met so far, there is every chance he meant what he wrote.
October 24, 2020: It is unusual for me to read back-to-back novels by the same author and for good reason, because subsequent ones fare poorly due to comparison fatigue. So I may or may not finish or like this so much for that reason... We shall see. But right now I am so enamored of Mr. Lewis...
Although satirical and humorous, Arrowsmith also describes many aspects of medical training, practice, and ethics and scientific research, public health, and personal/professional conflicts that would seem to be as relevant today as then. I am no scientist, nor medical professional and I certainly learned a great deal about both from this book, but it seemed to me it was not just a book meant to disparage their professions, only to highlight weaknesses inherent in all professions.
Highly recommended.
Lewis won the 1926 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction this 1925 novel and its certainly worth it, yet he declined the award. In a letter to the committee, he wrote:
I wish to acknowledge your choice of my novel Arrowsmith for the Pulitzer Prize. That prize I must refuse, and my refusal would be meaningless unless I explained the reasons.The New York Times reported that according to observers, the real reason was that Lewis was still upset that Main Street did not win the prize in 1921.
All prizes, like all titles, are dangerous. The seekers for prizes tend to labor not for inherent excellence but for alien rewards; they tend to write this, or timorously to avoid writing that, in order to tickle the prejudices of a haphazard committee. And the Pulitzer Prize for Novels is peculiarly objectionable because the terms of it have been constantly and grievously misrepresented.
Those terms are that the prize shall be given "for the American novel published during the year which shall best present the wholesome atmosphere of American life, and the highest standard of American manners and manhood." This phrase, if it means anything whatsoever, would appear to mean that the appraisal of the novels shall be made not according to their actual literary merit but in obedience to whatever code of Good Form may chance to be popular at the moment.
I say, give him the benefit of the doubt and take him at his word. Based on the stringent—even strident—integrity of his two main characters, I have met so far, there is every chance he meant what he wrote.
October 24, 2020: It is unusual for me to read back-to-back novels by the same author and for good reason, because subsequent ones fare poorly due to comparison fatigue. So I may or may not finish or like this so much for that reason... We shall see. But right now I am so enamored of Mr. Lewis...
May 19, 2022
1926 winner of the Pulitzer Prize, and as stated in Wikipedia, “Arrowsmith is generally acknowledged as a classic 'science novel', focusing on moral dilemmas bio-medical researchers may encounter.” I will admit that it took me a while to warm up to this novel but after about 1/3 of it, I was fully engrossed. Not quite a page turner but I was sad to come to the last page. I really enjoyed the arcing story following the protagonist from a young medical student throughout his career. Honestly I was surprised by the sophistication of medical science for the 1920s. I guess I shouldn’t have been, if quantum mechanics could have been developed in the 1920s then it follows that bacterias and scientific medicine would be established at roughly the same time. This book has a nice mixture of science, relationship, love and human drama.
August 15, 2011
Arrowsmith poses the perennial problem (perhaps that reaches back as far as the Greeks in terms of the sophists): do we follow the noble path of our profession and engage it purely without chasing after fame and comfort, or do we compromise and embrace the commercialist perspective? For love or money? Unlike Lewis' other books, with the exception of 'It Can't Happen Here', we have a heroic (albeit stumbling, oscillating) character. Not endowed with the wisdom and certainty of position like Doremus Jessup, Martin Arrowsmith is pulled in both directions by his sometimes fickle adoption of mentors. On the one hand, he is a devotee of Max Gottlieb's pure scientific research that is entirely lacking in glamour (but itself a kind of monastic purity) and on the other the perceived demands of making money by his practice. One of the undercurrents of the book - and I claim this as simply my interpretation - would be Dr Martin Arrowsmith's journey of seeking a paternal figure, for it seems that he is always hastening to fill that considerable absence in his life (very little is said about his own family life, a matter that is managed in the first few pages before it vanishes for good).
A timeless text (apart from some of the period-specific slang) that is in no way as satirical as Babbitt or Dodsworth and Main Street.
A timeless text (apart from some of the period-specific slang) that is in no way as satirical as Babbitt or Dodsworth and Main Street.
May 14, 2020
An enjoyable, engaging read about Dr. Martin Arrowsmith’s career as a physician and medical researcher in the early 1900s in the USA. Arrowsmith loves working in a laboratory as a bacteriologist, however he marries Leora and decides to establish himself as a country doctor in the small town of Wheatsylvannia. His lack of bedside manners and diplomacy impede his career prospects. After working as a country doctor, then as a public health officer, Arrowsmith fortuitously gains work with Dr Gottlieb, a researcher, who Arrowsmith had worked with as a medical student.
Lewis pokes fun at the moral shallowness, greed, self-delusion of the people Arrowsmith associates with. Many in the medical profession are more focused on how rich they can become.
Here are some examples of Sinclair’s writing style:
‘It is one of the major tragedies that nothing is more discomforting than the hearty affection of the Old Friends who never were friends.’
‘Like all males, he hated to confess ignorance by asking directions,’
‘He was permitted, without restriction, to speak of himself as immoral, agnostic and socialistic, so long as it was universally known that he remained pure, Presbyterian, and Republican.’
Winner of the 1926 Pulitzer Prize for fiction.
Lewis pokes fun at the moral shallowness, greed, self-delusion of the people Arrowsmith associates with. Many in the medical profession are more focused on how rich they can become.
Here are some examples of Sinclair’s writing style:
‘It is one of the major tragedies that nothing is more discomforting than the hearty affection of the Old Friends who never were friends.’
‘Like all males, he hated to confess ignorance by asking directions,’
‘He was permitted, without restriction, to speak of himself as immoral, agnostic and socialistic, so long as it was universally known that he remained pure, Presbyterian, and Republican.’
Winner of the 1926 Pulitzer Prize for fiction.
November 26, 2014
I can't quite put my finger on why I was so lukewarm on this. Nothing was awful, but, frankly, I can't find anything to praise either.
I don't know how long Sinclair Lewis took to write it. Martin Arrowsmith has several stages in his life, and the writing itself seems to change with it. I don't think that was intentional, just, perhaps, that Lewis improved as he went along. The prose never does get excellent, just that it improves.
I have a couple of other quibbles. In the earlier stages mid-westerners were narrow-minded, Christian capitalists and treated in a small way by Lewis. However, the atheistic socialists were presented in a good light. There are basically two women in the entire novel. We never learn what Leora does all day, and we are given almost no characterization of her. Actually, I don't think the characterizations of the men were all that great either, but most of them were closer to being real people.
I think I read his Babbit decades ago, and I'm probably finished with whatever Sinclair Lewis has to offer.
I don't know how long Sinclair Lewis took to write it. Martin Arrowsmith has several stages in his life, and the writing itself seems to change with it. I don't think that was intentional, just, perhaps, that Lewis improved as he went along. The prose never does get excellent, just that it improves.
I have a couple of other quibbles. In the earlier stages mid-westerners were narrow-minded, Christian capitalists and treated in a small way by Lewis. However, the atheistic socialists were presented in a good light. There are basically two women in the entire novel. We never learn what Leora does all day, and we are given almost no characterization of her. Actually, I don't think the characterizations of the men were all that great either, but most of them were closer to being real people.
I think I read his Babbit decades ago, and I'm probably finished with whatever Sinclair Lewis has to offer.
May 24, 2020
Set in the first decades of the 20th century, the reader is given a glimpse into the medical profession at that time. We follow Martin Arrowsmith from medical school, to country doctor, to small town health inspector, to big money pathologist to passionate scientist in bacteriology. Along the way, he marries, drinks too much, struggles with the direction of his life, gains fame, loses friends and so forth. This was a bit too slow moving and wordy for my current mood.
August 11, 2016
This author, in this novel, is to me a clear inheritor of Mark Twain's satirical bite and sheer funniness. The prose is not an aesthetic rival for Gatsby or Absalom but it's not trying for arresting style: it's trying for snappy directness and it glides along like Twain at his best, or Dickens in Pickwick. I'm stunned by some of the reviews here. Lewis was clearly a sharp comedian and a relentless critic of American society as it was (and basically still is), and in this novel is a rival for Babbitt in that its characters have more depth and heart, whereas Babbitt is only home to caricatures we don't quite like. As upsetting (?) as the 'message' under the surface may be, this is a book that allows for lightness and, god forbid in a literary masterpiece, smiling. Garrison Keillor and Kurt Vonnegut strike me as inheritors of Lewis, consciously or not. Having studied lit thru grad school, I'm dismayed at the low status Lewis holds in the larger academic consciousness. He can't trump (that verb is going to be unusable soon, isn't it?) a Faulkner or a Hemingway pound for pound, but he's not running the same race. This is a book to make you laugh, make you shake your head, make you think. It is not an overwhelming portrayal as life-as-it's-lived. We have Proust for that, we have Woolf. A social-commentary novel with well-drawn characters -- that are not inevitable tragedies of the mundane -- is not so common. Enjoy it.
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