An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser (i can read book club .TXT) 📕
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Clyde Griffith’s parents are poor street-preachers, but Clyde doesn’t “believe,” and finds their work demeaning. At fifteen he gets a job and starts to ease out of their lives, eventually landing in some trouble that causes him to flee the town where they live. Two years later, Clyde meets his well-off uncle, who owns a large factory in upstate New York. Clyde talks his way into a job at the factory, and soon finds himself supervising a roomful of women. All alone, generally shunned by his uncle’s family, and starved for companionship, he breaks the factory’s rules and begins a relationship with a young woman who works for him. But Clyde has visions of marrying a high-society woman, and fortune smiles on him in the form of the daughter of one of his uncle’s neighbors. Soon Clyde finds himself in a love triangle of his own making, and one from which he seems incapable of extracting himself.
A newspaperman before he became a novelist, Theodore Dreiser collected crime stories for years of young men in relationships with young women of poorer means, where the young men found a richer, prettier girl who would go with him, and often took extreme measures to escape from the first girl. An American Tragedy, based on one of the most infamous of those real-life stories, is a study in lazy ambition, the very real class system in America, and how easy it is to drift into evil. It is populated with poor people who desire nothing more than to be rich, rich people whose only concern is to keep up with their neighbors and not be associated with the “wrong element,” and elements of both who care far more about appearances than reality. It offers further evidence that the world may be very different from 100 years ago, but the people in it are very much the same.
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- Author: Theodore Dreiser
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“Yes, sir,” replied Clyde, always overawed and intrigued by this man.
“And for that reason, as I’ve so often told you, we’ve invented this other story about a change of heart. It’s not quite true as to time, but it is true that you did experience a change of heart there in the boat. And that’s our justification. But they’d never believe that under all of the peculiar circumstances, so we’re merely going to move that change of heart up a little, see? Make it before you ever went into that boat at all. And while we know it isn’t true that way, still neither is the charge that you intentionally struck her true, and they’re not going to electrocute you for something that isn’t true—not with my consent, at least.” He looked into Clyde’s eyes for a moment more, and then added: “It’s this way, Clyde. It’s like having to pay for potatoes, or for suits of clothes, with corn or beans instead of money, when you have money to pay with but when, because of the crazy notions on the part of someone, they won’t believe that the money you have is genuine. So you’ve got to use the potatoes or beans. And beans is what we’re going to give ’em. But the justification is that you’re not guilty. You’re not guilty. You’ve sworn to me that you didn’t intend to strike her there at the last, whatever you might have been provoked to do at first. And that’s enough for me. You’re not guilty.”
And here, firmly and convincingly, which was the illusion in regard to his own attitude which he was determined to convey to Clyde, he laid hold of his coat lapels, and after looking fixedly into his somewhat strained and now nervous brown eyes, added: “And now, whenever you get to feeling weak or nervous, or if, when you go on the stand, you think Mason is getting the best of you, I want you to remember this—just say to yourself—‘I’m not guilty! I’m not guilty! And they can’t fairly convict me unless I really am.’ And if that don’t pull you together, look at me. I’ll be right there. All you have to do, if you feel yourself rattled, is to look at me—right into my eyes, just as I’m looking at you now—and then you’ll know that I’m wanting you to brace up and do what I’m telling you to do now—swear to the things that we are asking you to swear to, however they may look like lies, and however you may feel about them. I’m not going to have you convicted for something you didn’t do, just because you can’t be allowed to swear to what is the truth—not if I can help it. And now that’s all.”
And here he slapped him genially and heartily on the back, while Clyde, strangely heartened, felt, for the time being at least, that certainly he could do as he was told, and would.
And then Jephson, taking out his watch and looking first at Belknap, then out of the nearest window through which were to be seen the already assembled crowds—one about the courthouse steps; a second including newspapermen and women, newspaper photographers and artists, gathered closely before the jail walk, and eagerly waiting to “snap” Clyde or anyone connected with this case—went calmly on with:
“Well, it’s about time, I guess. Looks as though all Cataraqui would like to get inside. We’re going to have quite an audience.” And turning to Clyde once more, he added: “Now, you don’t want to let those people disturb you, Clyde. They’re nothing but a lot of country people come to town to see a show.”
And then the two of them, Belknap and Jephson, going out. And Kraut and Sissel coming in to take personal charge of Clyde, while the two lawyers, passing amid whispers, crossed over to the court building in the square of brown grass beyond.
And after them, and in less than five minutes, and preceded by Slack and Sissel and followed by Kraut and Swenk—yet protected on either side by two extra deputies in case there should be an outbreak or demonstration of any kind—Clyde himself, attempting to look as jaunty and nonchalant as possible, yet because of the many rough and strange faces about him—men in heavy raccoon coats and caps, and with thick whiskers, or in worn and faded and nondescript clothes such as characterized many of the farmers of this region, accompanied by their wives and children, and all staring so strangely and curiously—he felt not a little nervous, as though at any moment there might be a revolver shot, or someone might leap at him with a knife—the deputies with their hands on their guns lending not a little to the reality of his mood. Yet only cries of: “Here he comes! Here he comes!” “There he is!” “Would you believe that he could do a thing like that?”
And then the cameras clicking and whirring and his two protectors shouldering closer and closer to him while he shrank down within himself mentally.
And then a flight of five brown stone steps leading up to an old courthouse door. And beyond that, an inner flight of steps to a large, long, brown, high-ceilinged chamber, in which, to the right and left, and in the rear facing east, were tall, thin, round-topped windows, fitted with thin panes, admitting a flood of light. And at the west end, a raised platform, with a highly ornamental, dark brown carved bench upon it. And behind it, a portrait—and on either side, north and south, and at the rear, benches and benches in rows—each tier higher than the other, and all crowded with people, the space behind them packed with standing bodies, and all
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