Literary Steel Cage Match between Upton Sinclair and Somerset Maugham. Throwing folding chairs will be permitted...

I originally called this post "Of Human Bondage and Main Street-Reviews and Literary Theory of the Difference Between Novels and Essays.", and then I realized that would bring almost no hits, and sounded like some of the essays I wrote in college, so I added a little zing to it.


I recently read two very good novels: Main Street by Upton Sinclair and Of Human Bondage by Somerset Maugham. My wife and I have this big list of all the important books, one should have read in college, and since we are in our forties we have some catching up to do. I have read "important" novels on the list in the past, but it didn't really strike me until these two novels why novels are as important as essays or other types of non-fiction. What I saw in both of these novels, and possibly expressed clearer by Sinclair's work especially was that novels are not only able to express complicated ideas through narrative, but they are able to illustrate these ideas in a more complete way than non-fiction and other genres. Now, some people will say that novels lack that classical form of an essay where you present evidence in an organized way in order to prove your thesis. While it’s true that novels don't always present truth in a didactic method, they can still effectively argue to prove a thesis.

The difference is that novels explore truths more completely by putting their characters in the midst of trying to live out what they believe. Not only that, but their beliefs are challenged by other characters in the novels who operate under different paradigms. Through the passage of time in the novel, we see characters changing their beliefs in response to their experiences. In this way, the novel has an almost organic feel to it. It does not seek to convince you of something based on reasoning alone, but instead uses the narrative as a vehicle to experiment with how different paradigms would play out in different situations. Now, because the novel does not rely on the same careful reasoning based on gathered evidence to prove its point, it has to convince the reader on a gut-level that the narrative resonates with their own real life experiences; the novel has to present a believable story, or any chance of proving any valid truths are lost.

We see a perfect example of these paradigm shifts in Main Street by Upton Sinclair. The main character is Carol, a liberal, self proclaimed reformer who naively believes she has all the answers to turn a small town into a progressive paradise. Sinclair was a very serious Socialist, with an extensive history of being heavily involved in politics. What I liked as a reader about this book was that there were some very sarcastic comments about the liberal naivete of Carol. She was elitist and condescending as she was oh so sincere about helping the little people. It’s an interesting novel in that you don’t really like the main character, at least not until later in the book, so her comeuppance is enjoyable on a purely nasty level.

When Carol marries a doctor from the small town of Gopher Prairie, Minnesota, she thinks she finally has her opportunity. When she arrives though, she sees how it won't be as easy as she thought. As she comes into contact with every part of society, from the banker to the socialist handyman, she fails at every endeavor to better the little town. She becomes involved in so many projects to help the poor and the deserving people, and either is thwarted by the pillars of polite society, or just screws it up herself.

One of the very interesting parts of this novel was how the point of view changed from Carol to other people. We saw how others wanted to improve the town in their own way and how they saw Carol’s endeavors. By the end of the book, Carol has changed to the point that we like her and care what happens to her. At least I did.

Now, between the two books, Of Human Bondage is the more enjoyable book to read. There were times when Main Street was a definite slog through the marshes. What’s so amazing about Of Human Bondage was that it starts out with the main character losing his mother and father and being sent off to live with his aunt and uncle. Even with this non-joyous start, and with the hero moving from failure to failure and never really having success, I could not put this book down. What was so incredible was that when I got to the last chapter of the book and got to the ending, I was so happy. It ended so well, and it was like the last three pages where Somerset Maugham summarizes, illustrates and explains the characters life in such a way that I felt so very contented that I basked in the goodness of a great book for several days, like a great meal. By the way, Somerset Maugham is the author of “The Razor’s Edge”, which is another remarkable book and worth the read. Don’t judge it by the Bill Murray movie version, its much better than that.

Thanks for reading,

AC