Arrowsmith by Sinclair Lewis :: Sinclair Lewis Arrowsmith

Arrowsmith, by Sinclair LewisIn the novel Arrowsmith, by Sinclair Lewis, written in1925, one can read of our worlds lack of idealism inscience, approximately often found in the medical profession(Encarta, 1). This book portrays the times in terms ofscientific advancement not being idealistic, mostly in themedical field. Our scientists could not come up with theirown ideas and our progress was going nowhere, fast.Although, today we are advancing so rapidly that we have no option but to move and experiment, there is no time to slowdown and copy old officiates. Sinclair Lewis also combines hislife and the life of a graduating microbiologists, who heinterviewed to foster him write this book, into his maincharacter, Dr. Martin Arrowsmith. All of this goes into thebook Arrowsmith. Sinclair lewis was born on the seventh of February, 1885,in the town of Sauk Centre, Minnesota, to his warmheartedparents, Emma Kermont Lewis and Dr. Edwin J. Lewis. At avery newborn age Sinclair read widely in grade school andcontinued on in his studies for many years (Grebstein, 16).Lewis studied at Yale University form 1903 trough 1906. Therehe studied literary writings and works to help him become awriter. His father had disagreed with his career choice,but he went on and did what he wanted to do most, write. Atone time he was so disgusted with his father that he ranaway and tried to join the Spanish-American War as adrummer boy (Cobletz, 248). He did not get far his fathercaught him originally he left town. Back to collage he went andeven finished collage Lewis still read many books. Oneprofessor was quoted as saying He was drawing more booksfrom the Yale library than, I believe, any undergraduatesbefore or since. Lewis was known to read such books fromauthors Hardy, Meredith, James, Howells, Austen, Bronte,Tolstoy, Pushkin, Turgenev, Gogol, Flaubert, Zola, Huneker,Pinero, Jones, Shaw, dAnnunzio, Sudermann, Yeats, GeorgeMoore, Nietzsche, Haeckel, Huxley, Moody, Marx, Gorky,Blake , Pater, Shelley, Keats, Coleridge, Rossetti,Swinburne, Clough, and Ibsen. All of these authors wereinfluential to him, but none more than the famous H. G.Wells (Grebstein 24). He accomplished all this during college time keeping twoor more jobs at one time and writing for several papersalong with his own books that he wrote. In October of 1906he left school for a few months and stayed with his brotherin his utopian colony in New Jersey. A few months later heremembered the work ethics his father taught him and wentback to school and got his degree in 1907.