Customer Reviews

Arrowsmith

5 star:		(26)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Sinclair Lewis is the bookend to F. Scott Fitzgerald. Both were born in Minnesota. Fitzgerald went to Princeton, Lewis to Yale. Both wrote their best books in the 1920s. Both drank, had women trouble, and turned bitter.

But Fitzgerald is everyone's favorite author --- even the high school kids who are clueless about metaphors swoon over "The Great Gatsby." You need an appreciation of satire to love Lewis; nobody does, and he goes unread.

It's understandable. What would you rather read --- a romantic tale about a poor boy's rise and violent death on the glittering shores of Long Island (Gatsby) or a withering take on narrow-minded life in the midwest (Main Street)? Who's more interesting --- a criminal who went to Oxford (Jay Gatsby) or a blowhard whose ambition is total conformity to soul-deadening values (George Babbitt)?

And yet. If you ask who describes America better, the more necessary writer is Sinclair Lewis. Main Street and Babbitt made his name, and most readers stop there. They shouldn't --- my wife, who once attended a one-room schoolhouse in Minnesota --- recently read "Main Street," and found it a very close description of life in our chic Manhattan neighborhood. Dodsworth --- later made into a toweringly great movie --- is as fine a love story as Fitzgerald ever dreamed up, and a lot more realistic one, at that. It Can't Happen Here is a powerful political drama with a subject that's not as far-fetched as you might think: how fascism comes to America.

And then there's Arrowsmith, which has an actual hero. Set in the midwest, it doesn't lack for satire; as Lewis depicts it, happiness in a small town seems to havbe the shelf life of about a year. And for a writer who won the Pulitzer Prize (and refused it), Lewis can write some dreadful dialogue. But the heroism thing --- that's compelling, and if you can move sprightly through the first half of the book, you'll find yourself getting excited and turning pages quickly for the right reason.

The hero is Martin Arrowsmith. We meet him in 1897, in the midwest town of Elk Mills ("a dowdy red-brick village, smelling of apples"), where he is the 14-year-old helper of the local doctor. Martin is prone to hero worship --- he sees magic in the old man's love of puttering in a lab. That ignites a dream in Martin, and so, seven years later, he's in medical school. There he falls under the spell of bacteriology professor Max Gottlieb: "tall, lean, aloof" --- and a Jew.

Gottlieb's love of science is pure; in an environment where many students and faculty think only of money, he alone seems to have ideals. Martin blossoms. But he's still a rube. He falls for a snooty graduate student in English and proposes marriage; later, he meets Leora, a nursing student, and proposes to her as well. His inept solution: to bring them together over lunch. Leora loves him more. They marry.

Leora's family is important --- in their tiny town of Wheatsylvania, North Dakota. But don't call them cultured: They lived in a house "that has a large phonograph but no books." Money talks, though. They bankroll Martin's first practice, and he settles into the life of a country doctor.

The novel is about the impossibility of "settling" --- as Martin climbs the medical ladder, he can't ignore research, his first love. He has a knack for it, and, to his delight, he's invited to join Gottlieb at a prestigious New York research institute. And now the novel kicks into high gear --- the plague has broken out in the Caribbean, and the vaccine that Arrowsmith has been working on might just be the cure.

Let me not spoil the thrill of these pages by revealing too much. Let's just say: success always comes at a price. And success doesn't always bring people what they most want. "Arrowsmith" is a book about the forces that fight to dominate us. As Lewis has it, that fight never ends.

"Arrowsmith" is smart about the world of research, and drug companies, and the modest ambitions of many men and women in white coats. It is also about the love of knowledge and the desire to heal; it gets the blood pumping. My brother --- one of our best AIDS researchers --- tells me that "Arrowsmith" is the book that made him decide to study medicine. Long before page 450, I could see why.

Author Sinclair Lewis had some exposure to the medical profession early in his life through his father, who was a country doctor. Yet, even with some personal exposure, it's amazing how much of the idealism and cynicism, evident in modern physician practice, Lewis portrays in his 1926 pulitizer prize winning book, "Arrowsmith". Martin Arrowsmith, M.D. is a fictional idealist who is a human being before all else, but trying to bring science to the practice of Medicine. Actually, the story seems almost autobiographical due to the personal intensity and human fraility of the complex main character. As a registered nurse, reading Arrowsmith brings flashbacks of the past, like the cliches "deja vu all over again", or worse, "the more things change, the more they stay the same". Medicine for financial- profit, patient care challenges, personality conflicts, political shenanigans, professional competition, and overutilization of medical technology are some of the common problems Arrowsmith faces as he pursues a career in medicine after barely struggling through the politics of medical school in the mythical town of Wheatsylvania, Midwest, USA, in the early 20th century. This is not another novel about how physicians affect people's lives, but a masterpiece about the nuances of the medical profession as mysterious and suspect,of physicians who are heros and villans. Most surprising are the humerous vignettes sprinkled throughout the plot like bits and pieces of old Jack Benny radio show skits. When Martin Arrowsmith must decide if he is to fulfill his promise to marry Madeline Fox or betray her for his soul mate Leora Tozer, the genious writer Lewis creates such humor in the ensuing restaurant scene, that should be frought with melodrama, but, instead, is absolutely delightful reading. Similar humor engulfs the life portrayed of Arrowsmith's employer, Pickerbaugh, and his fleet of daughters named after flowers, like the saucy Orchid. Arrowsmith is simply a joy to read, especially for people who have a flair for some classic literature without getting too deep into concentrated philosophic thought. Simply put, Arrowsmith today, were he to practice in modern medicine, would probably be no better or worse off than he was in 1908 through circa 1920, when the novel takes place. Arrowsmith is a classic American novel and an entertaining story.

Once again, Sinclair Lewis engulfed me. This is the fourth of his works that I have read (Elmer Gantry, Main Street and Babbit being the others) and although I didn't like Arrowsmith quite as much as those three, I still couldn't put it down.

Unlike so many novelists, Lewis' endings are impossible to predict. They're not necessarily happy, or tragic, they're open-ended, which often mirrors real life. For Martin Arrowsmith, he ends up, in a sense, free and able to devote the rest of his life to research without any distractions. At the same time, he's lost his first wife and deserted his second and their son.

Like the main characters of Lewis' other books, Elmer Gantry, Carol Kennicot and George Babbit, Martin Arrowsmith is not clearly a protagonist or an antagonist. The reader sympathizes with his frustrations, especially in dealing with his first wife's knee-jerk family. At the same time, I found myself rather angry with Martin's attitude now and then. Many of the other major characters: Max Gottleib (Arrowsmith's mentor), Almus Pickerbrauh, and Terry Wickett (Arrowsmith's friend and partner) evoke the same mixed reactions. Once again, I think this is an example of Lewis' realism, for in real life, there are few "pure" heroes; and even the noblest soul is tainted at times.

Read this book to understand the personal frustrations and conflicts that infect everyone's soul; read it for a contrasted depiction of American life in small towns, mid-sized cities and large metropolis' in the earlier 20th century. But read it.

This book won the 1926 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction. Lewis also won the 1930 Nobel Prize in Literature. It is the story of Martin Arrowsmith, a medical researcher who, while attending a mid-western medical school, is influenced by an aged bacteriologist. Arrowsmith marries a nurse, who will encourage his career in research, and tries his hand at private practice. However, he fails in that endeavor. After a number of positions he joins a research institute in New York where he discovers a new microorganism but is "scooped." He travels to the West Indies to try his "bacteriophage" on an epidemic. After his wife and colleague die, he starts administering the serum indiscriminately, destroying the results of his experiment. He returns to New York and marries a rich widow. However, social life interferes with his research and his search for truth. He quits the Institute and establishes a lab in Vermont with Terry Wickett, an uncouth but conscientious chemist. The model for Terry Wickett was Dr. John Howard Northrup (1891-1987), who will later win the 1946 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Apparently, the model for Martin Arrowsmith was provided by the microbiologist and writer Paul de Kruif, whose book "Microbe Hunters" became very popular. The novel also contrasts the idealism of the research scientist, who unfortunately looses touch with those that care for him, and the apparent avarice of the medical profession.

I first read Arrowsmith as assigned reading while I was studying American Literature as a high school junior. As a boy already preparing for a career in science, I was shocked to find scientists portrayed as vain, publicity-seeking hacks! At the time I imagined that such was the nature of science in the early twentieth century; surely things had changed in the post-sputnik world of the Cold War America in which I lived. Once I went on to graduate school, however, I found a world very much like that portrayed by Sinclair Lewis! I continue to work as a scientist and researcher and continue to be amazed by the accuracy of this book! Happily, Arrowsmith provides a source of idealism as well as cynicism. Any young person who is considering a career in science or engineering research should read this book to prepare him or her for that which lies ahead.

Read Arrowsmith early in life, and you'll want to become a doctor, marry a Leora, and read everything else Sinclair Lewis wrote. While not "fashionable," Arrowsmith's search for truth and his relationship with Leora are far beyond any politically correct world view. The writing is incredible. When I first read it (a dozen or so times ago), I could not fathom how any writer could be so creative, so different, so perfect. Give it to your favorite teenager. You could change his or her life.

A period piece of early twentieth century America, this book still remains a worthwhile read in spite of typed, flat, and cardboard caricatures of the players in the story. The sometimes didactic discussion of `doing the right thing' is timeless and worth consideration by any generation of readers. The tension of what is right versus what is good in Arrowsmith's science and medical profession can be teased and tested beyond that parochial domain. Every reader's battle with that tension will find a thorough airing of important considerations for their own lives through Arrowsmith's saga.

Martin Arrowsmith is a man with a mission, a scientific truth-seeker, an idealist who perpetually returns to his pure research interests despite the material influences and social pressures of the world around him.

Lewis's biographical novel portrays Arrowsmith, accompanied by his sympathetic wife, Leora, in a roundabout career from medical student to small-town doctor to public health administrator to bacteriology researcher. From boyhood to middle age, Arrowsmith walks a lonesome road, placing verifiable scientific knowledge and sincere craftsmanship above money, publicity, political power and social status (this is Lewis's affront to American "commercialism"). Ultimately, Arrowsmith is heroic in his remarkable perseverance and quest for truth, although some might label him a cold-hearted escapist for deserting his wealthy second wife, young child and promising New York City career in favor of a rustic laboratory and rugged backwoods existence on a fellow rebel researcher's Vermont farm.

Modern readers will find Arrowsmith's devotion to his early 20th century "science as truth" dogma somewhat tiring, narrow and dated. Yet, in a broader sense, what is most important is that Arrowsmith consistently remains true to his core personal belief (which in his case just so happens to be scientific truth). His unwavering self-honesty is what makes Arrowsmith an eternally heroic figure.

However powerful its message, the novel unfortunately reads like a patchwork of stages in our hero's career, somewhat artificially connected with the support of unconvincing reappearances of Arrowsmith's medical school classmates later in their careers (e.g., the sudden reappearance of the crazed, doctor-turned-missionary Reverend Ira Hinkley on Arrowsmith's trip to fight the plague in the West Indies, where incidentally Leora tragically dies). I conjecture that in reaching beyond the familiarity of his family's medical practice and venturing into the more rarified realm of scientific research, Lewis has stretched--as a chronicler commonly does but, I would say, a novelist should not--too far outside his own life experiences. The result is that this classic novel falls short of becoming a more emotionally engaging literary work with a truly believable flow of realistic life events.

The central conflict of this novel--commercialism versus scientific idealism--reveals a different sort of author than we see in Babbitt and Elmer Gantry. In these earlier novels, Lewis neglects to offer a clear alternative to the unspiritual, conformist materialism of George Babbitt and Elmer Gantry.

(O.K., Seneca Doane and Frank Shallard do represent an antidote of sorts. But Doane gets little attention in Babbitt and, considering his condition at the end of Elmer Gantry, Shallard's "philosophy" seems as futile as Gantry's.)

In Arrowsmith, readers finally get a clear sense of one sort of life--and one sort of culture--that Lewis would prefer, namely, one dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge rather than material gain or intellectual homogeneity. In his pursuit of truth, Martin Arrowsmith faces many obstacles. He must overcome the accepted belief that one's duty in life is to make other people comfortable with themselves, no matter how shallow or simple-minded they might be. He must overcome the natural human desires for love, fame, money, respect, etc. Lewis's recognition of such conflicts makes Martin Arrowsmith's life more believable. But, at the same time, Arrowsmith's imperviousness to the usual effects of these conflicts--pessimism, greater self-awareness, less self-confidence, to name a few--seems suspiciously optimistic.

I doubt many readers will recognize Leora Tozer as a legitimate female character, some critics to the contrary. No doubt she represents an ideal from the perspective of many men: she lives ONLY to care for and to please Martin Arrowsmith. But does anyone know such a woman?

I'm surprised to see so many less than stellar reviews of this book, because I really enjoyed it. Those who like tales of the early discoveries in classical microbiology, told with excitement as in Paul de Kruif's Microbe Hunters, will find plenty to love in these albeit fictional chapters. While the story can really get you excited about science, it also shows that, no matter how well-intentioned and important one's work may be, there can be exorbitant costs associated with too much passion for it. Good lessons for anyone contemplating in a career in science, which can easily consume too much of one's life, in my opinion. Beyond this, I throroghly enjoyed the characters, humor and description of the places and times. This is a book that is well worth reading.