A Dreiser Checklist, 1998–1999
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The Outward Turn: Personality, Blankness, and Allure in American Modernism Anne Claire Diebel Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 2013 © 2013 Anne Claire Diebel All rights reserved ABSTRACT The Outward Turn: Personality, Blankness, and Allure in American Modernism Anne Claire Diebel The history of personality in American literature has surprisingly little to do with the differentiating individuality we now tend to associate with the term. Scholars of nineteenth- and twentieth-century American culture have defined personality either as the morally vacuous successor to the Protestant ideal of character or as the equivalent of mass-media celebrity. In both accounts, personality is deliberately constructed and displayed. However, hiding in American writings of the long modernist period (1880s–1940s) is a conception of personality as the innate capacity, possessed by few, to attract attention and elicit projection. Skeptical of the great American myth of self-making, such writers as Henry James, Theodore Dreiser, Gertrude Stein, Nathanael West, and Langston Hughes invented ways of representing individuals not by stable inner qualities but by their fascinating—and, often, gendered and racialized—blankness. For these writers, this sense of personality was not only an important theme and formal principle of their fiction and non-fiction writing; it was also a professional concern made especially salient by the rise of authorial celebrity. This dissertation both offers an alternative history of personality in American literature and culture and challenges the common critical assumption that modernist writers took the interior life to be their primary site of exploration and representation. -
Naturalism, the New Journalism, and the Tradition of the Modern American Fact-Based Homicide Novel
INFORMATION TO USERS This manuscript has been reproduced from the microfilm master. UMI films the text directly from the original or copy submitted. Thus, some thesis and dissertation copies are in typewriter face, while others may be from any type of computer printer. The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. Broken or indistinct print, colored or poor quality illustrations and photographs, print bleedthrough, substandard margins, and improper alignment can adversely affect reproduction. In the unlikely event that the author did not send UMI a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if unauthorized copyright material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. Oversize materials (e.g., maps, drawings, charts) are reproduced by sectioning the original, beginning at the upper left-hand corner and continuing from left to right in equal sections with small overlaps. Each original is also photographed in one exposure and is included in reduced form at the back of the book. Photographs included in the original manuscript have been reproduced xerographically in this copy. Higher quality 6" x 9" black and white photographic prints are available for any photographs or illustrations appearing in this copy for an additional charge. Contact UMI directly to order. U·M·I University Microfilms International A Bell & Howell Information Company 300 North Zeeb Road. Ann Arbor. Ml48106-1346 USA 3131761-4700 800!521-0600 Order Number 9406702 Naturalism, the new journalism, and the tradition of the modern American fact-based homicide novel Whited, Lana Ann, Ph.D. -
Theodore Dreiser's Ponderation on American Society and Ruination Of
Vol. 5, No. 6 Asian Social Science From American Dreams to American Tragedies — Theodore Dreiser’s Ponderation on American Society and Ruination of Morality Chengcheng Zhang & Hui Zhang Foreign Language Teaching & Researching Department, Hebei University Baoding 071002, Hebei Province, China E-mail: [email protected] The research is financed by Hebei University Humanity and Social Science Project. No. XSK0701025 Abstract Theodore Herman Albert Dreiser is one of America's greatest naturalist writers. He believed that human beings are helpless in the grip of instincts and social forces beyond their control, and he judged human society as an unequal contest between the strong and the weak. Both of his masterpieces Sister Carrie (1900) and An American Tragedy (1925), which were mostly based on his personal experience, expanded and clarified those themes. By comparing Theodore Dreiser’s Sister Carrie and An American Tragedy, this thesis analyzes the author’s exploration of the possibilities of 20th century American life with its material profusion and spiritual doubt of the life value. Keywords: American dreams, American tragedies, Comparison, Morality 1. Historical background 1.1 About the author Theodore Herman Albert Dreiser was the ninth of 10 surviving children in a family whose perennial poverty forced frequent moves between small Indiana towns and Chicago in search of a lower cost of living. In 1943, he wrote to one of his friend, “unlike yourself I am biased. I was born poor. For a time in November and December once I went without -
The American Tragedy Murder
HARVEYSLAKE.ORG The American Tragedy Murder Official Detective Stories presents The American Tragedy Murder By Grant Frobisher On July 31, the body of twenty‐six year old Freda Theodore Dreiser had published the most monumental of his novels, An American Tragedy, in 1925. He based it on an McKechnie of Edwardsville turned up in Harvey’s Lake at actual case that had unfolded in the vicinity of Herkimer, New Myers Grove, near Sandy Beach. Two teenagers in a rowboat, York, between 1905 and 1908. A murdered woman, Grace Nathan Schoenburn and his girlfriend, saw the body floating Brown, was found with a bruise on her forehead in Big Moose face down; it was also spotted from the shore by a five year Lake. Investigators learned that she and a man named old girl, Betty DaCosta. Chester Gillette were lovers, that she was pregnant by him, Shortly thereafter police arrested Robert Allan Edwards, and that he wished to marry another, and wealthier, woman. age twenty‐three, also of Edwardsville, and charged that he Gillette was found guilty and electrocuted at Auburn had bludgeoned the pregnant McKechnie with a blackjack in Penitentiary in March 1908. order to be free to marry the younger, wealthier and prettier The All‐American looking Robert Edwards, better known Margaret Crain, a native of upstate New York. as Bobby, was a young man whose aspirations for a college Page 1 HARVEYSLAKE.ORG The American Tragedy Murder degree had been sidetracked by the Depression. He had to life. drop out of Mansfield State Teachers’ College and take a job On the evening of July 30, Edwards and McKechnie drove as a mine surveyor with the Kingston Coal Company. -
Table of Contents
Table of Contents ISSUE 11 • 2016 4 6 22 36 50 Featured Articles 4 Kaye on Jay: Revisited by Judith S. Kaye 6 Asian-Americans and the Law by Denny Chin & Kathy Hirata Chin 22 People v. Gillette and Theodore Dreiser’s An American Tragedy: Law v. Literature by Susan N. Herman 36 “Jacobin Winds”: Chief Justice James Kent and the Origins of the Citizenship Prerequisite for Admission to the New York Bar by Craig A. Landy 50 The Formation of New York’s Commercial Division – A History & Memoir by Mark H. Alcott Departments 3 From the Executive Director 58 A Look Back… and Forward 63 Society Officers, Trustees & Supporting Members 64 Are You a Member? From the Executive Director Dear Members, JUDICIAL his, our 11th issue, continues the high standards of scholarship and engaging topics in a NOTICE beautiful publication; a tradition begun by our Founder, Judith S. Kaye. Her passing this year makes the issue very personally poignant. To my recollection, every issue bears her stamp in someT fashion. For instance, when our extremely gifted and diligent editors finished their review and the • final proofs were sent to Judge Kaye, she always found another edit as she donned her journalist hat…often Editor-In-Chief buried in a footnote that was one of dozens! She has contributed regularly to this publication as a writer. Henry M. Greenberg A particular interest for her was John Jay. We published her article Kay on Jay in Issue 8. There, she focused on Jay the Family Man. In this issue, Judge Kaye reports on an event she attended at John Jay College of Managing Editor Criminal Justice where a bronze statue of John Jay was unveiled. -
Iii Theodore Dreiser's an American Tragedy
CHAPTER - III THEODORE DREISER’S AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY- A DREAM GONE SOUR The decade after the Civil War, new literature began to appear in the U.S. Its forms were dedicated to a single theme; the life in America was a fluid and wide open race in which every one competed on equal basis, i.e. winner takes all. The 1920s were the salad days of great American novel, which includes the pervasiveness of ambition from Lewis, William, Hoyed Dell and Sherwood Anderson. On the editorial side, Horace Liveright put that authority to effective use. Theodore Dreiser (1871-1945) was the first American writer, who is not of the old American tradition. He was peculiarly nebulous, emotional and a traditionless character, who asserted with the blunt directness, that no other American writer at the turn of the century could match. Since the beginning, his mother urged him the need of strength, ambition, practical approach in life, and to defend himself. Further, he prepared himself for the battle of life. Like her, he was very much optimistic and a dreamer. For him success could mean burning with desire. He dreamt of the mansions that “should belong to me [...] the beauties who should note and receive 134 me.”1 Pluck and luck meant success, and success meant wealth and women. In the summer of 1920, when he was living in Los Angeles, Dreiser began writing An American Tragedy. It is difficult to establish in a systematic way as to when did he first contemplate to write this book, but the structure, and idea were in his mind long before he was compelled to write it. -
ABSTRACT TRUE CRIME DOES PAY: NARRATIVES of WRONGDOING in FILM and LITERATURE Andrew Burt, Ph.D. Department of English Norther
ABSTRACT TRUE CRIME DOES PAY: NARRATIVES OF WRONGDOING IN FILM AND LITERATURE Andrew Burt, Ph.D. Department of English Northern Illinois University, 2017 Scott Balcerzak, Director This dissertation examines true crime’s ubiquitous influence on literature, film, and culture. It dissects how true-crime narratives affect crime fiction and film, questioning how America’s continual obsession with crime underscores the interplay between true crime narratives and their fictional equivalents. Throughout the 20th century, these stories represent key political and social undercurrents such as movements in religious conservatism, issues of ethnic and racial identity, and developing discourses of psychology. While generally underexplored in discussions of true crime and crime fiction, these currents show consistent shifts from a liberal rehabilitative to a conservative punitive form of crime prevention and provide a new way to consider these undercurrents as culturally-engaged genre directives. I track these histories through representative, seminal texts, such as Theodore Dreiser’s An American Tragedy (1925), W.R. Burnett’s Little Caesar (1929, Jim Thompson’s The Killer Inside Me (1952), and Barry Michael Cooper’s 1980s new journalism pieces on the crack epidemic and early hip hop for the Village Voice, examining how basic crime narratives develop through cultural changes. In turn, this dissertation examines film adaptations of these narratives as well, including George Stevens’ A Place in the Sun (1951), Larry Cohen’s Black Caesar (1972), Michael Winterbottom’s The Killer Inside Me (2010), and Mario Van Peeble’s New Jack City (1991), accounting for how the medium changes the crime narrative. In doing so, I examine true crime’s enduring resonance on crime narratives by charting the influence of commonly overlooked early narratives, such as execution sermons and murder ballads. -
An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser - Monkeynotes by Pinkmonkey.Com Pinkmonkey® Literature Notes On
An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser - MonkeyNotes by PinkMonkey.com PinkMonkey® Literature Notes on . http://monkeynote.stores.yahoo.net/ Sample MonkeyNotes Note: this sample contains only excerpts and does not represent the full contents of the booknote. This will give you an idea of the format and content. An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser 1925 MonkeyNotes by Ray Mescallado Reprinted with permission from TheBestNotes.com Copyright © 2005, All Rights Reserved Distribution without the written consent of PinkMonkey.com or TheBestNotes.com is strictly prohibited. http://monkeynote.stores.yahoo.net/ PinkMonkey.com/TheBestNotes.com. Copyright © 2005, All Rights Reserved. No further distribution without written consent. 1 http://monkeynote.stores.yahoo.net/ An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser - MonkeyNotes by PinkMonkey.com KEY LITERARY ELEMENTS SETTING Taking place in the United States in the first quarter of the twentieth century, An American Tragedy follows…... CHARACTER LIST MAJOR CHARACTERS Clyde Griffiths - A young man who aspires to rise out of poverty but commits murder to pursue this goal. Asa Griffiths - Clyde’s spiritually dedicated but otherwise dissolute father. Elvira Griffiths - Clyde’s spiritually dedicated and psychologically strong mother. Hester “Esta” Griffiths - Clyde’s older sister, who becomes pregnant out of wedlock. Samuel Griffiths - Clyde’s uncle and Asa's brother, a successful businessman who owns a collar factory in Lycurgus, New York. Oscar Hegglund - A bell boy at the Green-Davidson who befriends Clyde. Thomas Ratterer - A bell boy at the Green-Davidson who befriends Clyde. Hortense Briggs - A friend of Louise Ratterer who Clyde romantically pursues. Willard Sparser - A friend of Hegglund who borrows his boss’s Packard for the fatal automobile trip. -
Sister Carrie and an American Tragedy 3
SISfER CARRIE AND AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY: THE PUBLISHERS' JUDGMENTS A Thesis Presented to the Graduate Faculty School of Humanities Morehead State University In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts in English by Barbara A. Martin May 1981 Accepted by the faculty of the School of Humanities, Morehead State University, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Master of Arts degree. ~or of Thesi Master's Cammi t tee '--~~"SiRo-~---"-"...<"-{-~-'--"~.:.D_,...""--==---' Chairman d..A_;.117 TABLE OF CONTENTS Page INTRODUCTION 1 CHAPTER I. Corresponding Elements in Sister Carrie and An American Tragedy 3 II. Changing Literary Tastes 24 III. Conclusion 44 BIBLIOGRAPHY 47 SISTER CARRIE AND AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY: THE PUBLISHERS' JUDGMENTS Barbara A. Martin, MA Morehead State University, 1980 Theodore Dreiser's literary career spans a time of change in social, political, and economic elements in American society, espe- cially 1900-1925. These changes appear to be shown through a shift in publishers' attitudes as evidenced by their rejection of Sister Carrie in 1900 and their acceptance of An American Tragedy in 1925. Sister Carrie was rejected for publication by Harper's weekly and Harper and Brothers. It was accepted by Walter Page for Doubleday, Page; however, Doubleday refused to publish the novel because he considered it pornographic. When forced by Dreiser, Doubleday pub lished the novel but refused to promote its sale. Later, Dreiser submitted An American Tragedy for publication and the novel was readily accepted by Liveright who promoted its sale with an essay contest offering $500 as first prize. The purpose of this thesis is to discover why Sister Carrie was rejected in 1900 and An American Tragedy accepted twenty-five years later. -
The Un-Natural Woman: a Study of Dreiser's Major Women Characters
RICE UNIVERSITY THE UN-NATURAL WOMAN: A STUDY OF DREISER’S MAJOR WOMEN CHARACTERS by BARBARA BUCKWALTER CARLITZ A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS Thesis Director's Signature: April, 1964 ABSTRACT The purpose of this study is the exploration of Dreiser's use of naturalism through the various women char¬ acters whom he created. Two novels (The Genius and The Bul¬ wark) are eliminated. In the remaining six novels, the principal women characters are analyzed and compared with the essential aspects of naturalistic treatment of character, particularly feminine character. Secondarily noted are pos- ' sible influences on Dreiser other than naturalism and the general trend of his literary and philosophic thought. A close analysis of characterization shows that for his earliest novels (Sister Carrie and Jennie Gerhardt), Dreiser was dependent on Intuition and experience. His orient ation is somewhat naturally "naturalistic," but his characters are rather sentimentalized. Later works (such as An American Tragedy) suggest that Dreiser deliberately attempted a naturalistic characterization; to some degree he succeeded. Final portraits (in his "Trilogy of Desire") Indicate a turn to the mystic or spiritual emphasis in characterization. On the basis of such a progression of women characters, one finds some difficulty in endorsing whole-heartedly the view that Dreiser is a naturalistic novelist. One must admit v/ith Dreiser himself that he is to a great degree "romantic." This paradox of two philosophic and literary points of view is quite apparent in the seven women characters under study. TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION ........ 1 CHAPTER I . -
NARRATIVE DESIGN in an AMERICAN TRAGEDY by WILLIAM
NARRATIVE DESIGN IN AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY By WILLIAM A. SHUTE '/' Bachelor of Arts Metropolitan State College Denver, Colorado 197-9 Submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate College of the Oklahoma State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of MASTER OF ARTS July, 1983 NARRATIVE DESIGN IN AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY Thesis Approved: ii 1161104 t PREFACE The mere living of your daily life . is drastic drama. I look into my own life and I realize that each human life is a simi lar tragedy. The infinite suffering and de privation of great masses of men and women upon whom existence has been thrust unasked appals me. My greatest desire is to devote every hour of my conscious existence to de picting phases of life as I see and under- stand them. Every human life is in- tensely interesting. Theodore Dreiser, 1907 interview with New York Times Saturday Review of Books How do we know the "power" or the "compas sion"--know them differently, that is, from the power or compassion we may read into a news story--except by Dreiser's control? Except, in other words, by his grasp of the human materials and his rhythmic organization of them, the vibrance which is the life of fictional illusion, that mutual interpenetra tion of part and whole which gives us the sense of preternatural fulfillment? Except, in short, by art? · Robert Penn Warren, "Homage to Theodore Dreiser on the Centenary of His Birth~ Theodore Dreiser occupies a unique niche in the his- tory of American letters. No other author considered "im- portant," with the possible exception of James Fenimore Cooper, is presented by his critical advocates in such an apologetic, defensive, and extra-literary manner. -
MORAL VALUE VIOLATIONS in an AMERICAN TRAGEDY NOVEL by THEODORE DREISER (A Study of Psychoanalisis)
BAHTERA: Jurnal Pendidikan Bahasa dan Sastra, Volume 18 Nomor 1 Januari 2019 http://journal.unj.ac.id/unj/index.php/bahtera/ P-ISSN : 0853-2710 E-ISSN : 2540-8968 MORAL VALUE VIOLATIONS IN AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY NOVEL BY THEODORE DREISER (A Study of Psychoanalisis) Muhammad Briyan Agunginardi Language Education Study Program, Postgraduate Program, Universitas Negeri Jakarta [email protected] Aceng Rahmat Language Education Study Program, Postgraduate Program, Universitas Negeri Jakarta [email protected] Fahrur Rozi Language Education Study Program, Postgraduate Program, Universitas Negeri Jakarta [email protected] ABSTRACT This research is a qualitative research. The technique is content analysis using the data in the form of words, phrases, and sentences. Writer uses a psychoanalysis study. In revealing moral values infringement, writer focuses on three questions; how are the type, cause, and effect of moral values violations in the story. Based on psychoanalysis, there is a moral value infringement. The type of moral values infringement is a murdering case. The cause of moral values violations is a self ambition to reach wealth and prosperity. The effect of moral values violations is a charge of death sentence. Based on the research, there are practical implications in education; to improve the quality and quantity of literature learning in high schools in accordance with the objectives contained in the curriculum. Teachers invites the students to enjoy literature study to differ on good and bad moral teachings and to enhance their ability in using English. Keywords: Moral, psychoanalisis, novel INTRODUCTION understanding a foreign language. The title of this thesis is Moral Besides, novel also gives a Value Violations in An American psychological impact to the reader Tragedy Novel by Theodore Dreiser because it consists of problematic stories which is based on a true story.