Despite having two novels that were big hits in the early 20th century, and having been nominated for a Nobel Prize, Theodore Dreiser (1871-1945) is not well-known today. "Sister Carrie" (published in 1900) and "An American Tragedy" (1925) are far and away the best known of his 10 novels (and two plays); the latter was named one of the 100 Best Novels of the 20th Century by the Modern Library.

    The story turns on a true incident: In 1908, a young man named Chester Gillette was tried, convicted, and executed in the electric chair for killing a 20-year-old woman named Grace Brown, whose body was found floating in a lake in 1906. Dreiser followed newspaper accounts of the trial closely, and based his character Clyde Griffiths (note the initials) on Gillette.

    In Dreiser's telling, the "tragedy" of the title is not just the death of the girl (named "Roberta Alden" in the novel), but the gradual moral decline of Griffiths. Born into a religious family, he begins erring in small ways almost as soon as he leaves the nest. Over time, he becomes less and less upright in his choices, running after wealth and status. The girl had an unwanted pregnancy by Griffiths, at the same time he was courting a society girl who could help him fulfill his vision of himself. She had to go.

    Clyde's weakness is brought out exquisitely in the trial. There is only circumstantial evidence against him, but he incriminates himself by contradicting his own testimony, and seems unclear on the details of what happened that day. The police, convinced of his guilt, manufacture evidence against him, and the judge and jury are not sympathetic. To top things off, his legal team mounts a dishonest defense that, in the end, fails.

    Clyde Griffiths is, in a way, the anti-Gatsby, from the same humble beginnings and with the same vaunting ambitions as Fitzgerald's enigmatic "hero" in a novel published the same year, but unable to achieve the success he so desperately desires. In the end, both fall victim to their versions of the American Dream.

    Vocabulary: Which word above means:

    1. make up "facts" to convict a person

    2. moves out of his parents' home

    3. having a baby without planning to

    4. mysterious, hard to understand

    5. saying the opposite of

    6. plans to avoid a conviction

    7. making mistakes

    8. honest

    9. requiring some reasoning, not direct

    10. shows one to be guilty

    ANSWERS: 1. manufacture evidence 2. leaves the nest 3. unwanted pregnancy 4. enigmatic 5. contradicting 6. mounts a defense 7. erring 8. upright 9. circumstantial evidence 10. incriminates