Sinclair Lewis's Dodsworth

About Dodsworth

Sinclair Lewis's Dodsworth (1929) is the conclusion of his great decade of American satire — Samuel Dodsworth, the successful Zenith City auto manufacturer who retires and travels to Europe, only to find his marriage to Fran dissolving as she pursues European fantasies. Where Babbitt (1922) is pure satire, Dodsworth is Lewis's most sympathetic portrait of an American businessman, showing Sam Dodsworth as capable of growth and self-examination that Babbitt cannot achieve. Walter Huston starred in William Wyler's celebrated 1936 film adaptation. Dodsworth completes the informal set of Lewis's American institutional satires that includes Main Street, Babbitt, Arrowsmith, and Elmer Gantry.