Sinclair Lewis
WORLD SO WIDE (1950, 1951) Two reviews (A) Review for http://www.barnesandnoble.com Here is how your review will appear on the title page: REVIEWER: T. Patrick Killough (patrick@thekilloughs.com), in search of the real Sinclair Lewis, June 2, 2005. BOOK RATING: Three Stars * * * REVIEW TITLE: the last weary hurrah of America's first Nobel Prize winner for literature Young Mr Hayden Chart survives a car wreck which kills his wife. He seeks solace abroad, spending much time in Florence, Italy, which he studies as the architect he has been. He is tempted to build his life around two women-- both at once, if possible. The first is a very intellectual fellow American Dr Olivia Lomond, a student of Renaissance, Italy. At one point she made a pet of a house fly; it seemed a lonely woman's only friend in Italy. For most of the novel Chart seems inclined to re-align his mind and tastes after hers. But in the end he opts for life with a fellow small town American, reporter Roxanna Eldritch. She is unpretentious, honest and has secretly loved Hayden Chart since she was ten and he eighteen. It is enough to tip the balance in her favor. All this plays out against the backdrop of mid twentieth century Florence and its interlocking circles of expatriates, phonies and alcoholics: some impressive, some not. WORLD SO WIDE at times reads like a tourist’s guide to a beautiful city in Italy. There is little probing of politics but some final satirizing of pretentiousness and deceit (WORLD SO WIDE was the nobel prize winner's last novel and published shortly after his lonely, alcoholic death). -OOO- Also recommended: Sinclair Lewis: OUR MR. WRENN, IT CAN'T HAPPEN HERE, FRESH AIR and ELMER GANTRY. 06/01/2005 (B) Review for http://www.amazon.com Here is your review the way it will appear: REVIEW TITLE: Across a wide world from Colorado to Italy BOOK RATING: Three Stars * * * REVIEWER: T. Patrick Killough (Black Mountain, NC United States) Sinclair Lewis died in Florence, Italy January 10, 1951. His last novel, published shortly after his death, is set in that city and portrays a segment, generally unlovely, of Florence's expatriate communities, mainly American. WORLD TOO WIDE is the story of young, recently widowed ex-Army major and architect Hayden Chart. He strives mightily to find personal meaning in Florence. Beautiful fellow American Dr Olivia Lomond is a budding scholar who tempts him to make his mind grow in appreciation of art and history. But earthy, honest Roxanna Eldritch,home town girl and reporter sent to Europe to cover the 1950 Holy Year in Rome, improbably wins Chart's heart in the end. Apart from its utility as a tourist guide to Florence, WORLD TOO WIDE is Sinclair Lewis's last chance to skewer pretentiousness and hypocrisy. His instrument for ferreting out lies among the expatriates is red-headed American reporter Roxanna (Roxy) Eldritch. She had been a friend of Hayden's recently deceased wife back in their native Newlife, Colorado. Towards novel's end Roxy punctures the facades of two expatriates. First is young, proto-fascist pseudo-intellectual American Lorenzo Lundsgard who is preparing a series of lectures supported by films and shoddy research designed to prove that history teaches that great men have always ruled the world through their innate gifts of leadership. Roxy's contacts as a journalist allow her to confront him with his lies about his real Christian name, which is Oley. He had, moreover, been married twice and was twice messily divorced, despite his claims never to have wed. Lundsgard is a favorite of and financially dependent on the next phony that Roxanna skewers. With Lorenzo, Roxy was just warming up for Sir Henry Belfont, an English gentleman's English gentleman, a snob with infinite contempt for all things American. Roxy's sources have revealed Sir Henry's true past: he was born in Ohio; his grandfather had made a fortune selling shoddy goods to both sides in the Civil War; Lundsgard never saw England until age 14, later bought a seat in Parliament and a title. The enraged Belfont turns on Lundsgard, cuts off his funding for research, lectures and documentary films and, somehow, some way, drives our hero Hayden Chart definitively into the arms of the spunky, honest, all American Roxy Eldritch. Lundsgard then inexplicably lands a cushy foreign service job in South America and Olivia Lomond seems disposed to go there with him at the curtain. In 1914 Sinclair Lewis's first novel OUR MR. WRENN began outside the Nickelorion movie house in New York City. 1951's WORLD TOO WIDE, Lewis's final novel, ended with the hero and his new bride happily relaxing in a bar in Ravenna, Italy. The world of SInclair Lewis was not often deep but it was always wide. He traveled through it. ever restless, ever hoping for something better, only to end in drink, dissipation and loneliness. R.I.P. -OOO- |