Is An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser the greatest book ever?

It was one of the first "serious" novels I read as a teen and I couldn't put it down. A few years ago I read "The Prison Diary and Letters of Chester Gillette," whose crime inspired Dreiser; he matured a lot in prison (although he never was much of a writer) and, it is strongly implied, admitted his guilt before he was executed.

R1, I'll have to read that one

It depends on your own taste. It might be the greatest book you've ever read, but some people prefer other stuff.

I'm about to read it again

My vote goes to Steinbeck’s East of Eden

No.

Try Flaubert's Sentimental Education

R7, will do

How did Shelly Winters get cast in this movie? She's the complete opposite of the tragic girl in the book. I mean you're rooting for Shelly to die. Monty should get a medal at the end of the film.

How is the first film adaptation of this book?

It's mentioned in this episode of Unsolved Mysteries.

I loved it and I also love Steinbeck East of Eden. And lots of others. But I can't say either was "the greatest book ever." Definitely on the list, though.

No. Middlemarch is the best novel.

It's a very good book, but I wouldn't even put it above all American novels, and there are tons of British and French and Russian novels better than the best American novel (which I would contend is Moby-Dick).

It's a great novel. His novel Sister Carrie is also a great read and the two books have a number of parallels. I will always remember the line: "People like money even more than they do looks."

At times, I wish Clyde has been more cunning (and less naive) but perhaps his innocence in certain matters heightens the tragedy of the novel. The last third of the novel (concerning the trial) drags a little .

The greatest American novel is clearly BLOOD MERIDIAN.

Kill Kill Faster Faster

Catcher In The Rye

Huckleberry Finn has been touted for years as t he greatest American novel. I recently ordered Jim.. Percival Everett's book told from the perspective of the run away slave, Jim who shared the raft with Huck.

R13 is correct. Actually I can think of lots of novels better than anything Dreiser did.

Read “The Red and The Black” by Stendhal.

I did, R21. yawnnnn!

I prefer Thomas Pynchon, and this one’s about 80% shorter.

I visited both the cemetery where Grace Brown is buried (it’s a tiny lace, but there are signs pointing you to the poor) and the address where the factory was (each is 30-45 minutes from my home). The film is better than the book, which I’ve never made it through.

On the other hand, I live “Sister Carrie,” despite Dreiser’s sometimes leaden prose. Something in the story and characters always grabs me. And I like William Wyler’s film of it (“Carrie”) with Olivier superb as Hurstwood and Jennifer Jones well-cast as Carrie (if a little too old at the beginning).

[quote]The greatest American novel is clearly BLOOD MERIDIAN.

Ugh. Also, 'ugh' to the movie BLOOD TOMAHAWK.

Lonesome Dove is a great novel about the beginning of the American West. I'd put it in the top five of greatest books ever.

R26 Have you read Centennial by Michener?

If you enjoyed Lonesome Dove, which I loved, I think you’ll really appreciate Centennial.

It focuses on the descendants of 1 man, Pasquinell, a fur trapper, and the settlement and growth of 1 town in Colorado.

The actual story starts in the late 18th century and ends in the 1970s, but the opening chapters describe the formation of the land and the animals who lived there.

The subsequent miniseries was one of the few that lived up to the book.

I thought Truman Capote invented the True Crime Novel.

The House of Mirth is the greatest American novel.

And for a more contemporary pick I'd choose Ragtime.

I'd say Tolstoy is best novelist by a country mile, even George Eliot and Henry James can't match up to him.

No other novels have moved me as much as War and Peace and Anna Karenina. Tolstoy seemed to have his finger directly on the pulse of the human condition.

[quote]Greatest book ever

OP, spoken like a true bibliophile.

Truman got in his own way, but back when he was actually a writer he literally invented an entirely new genre with In Cold Blood. Truman was actually a very talented gifted writer, one of the greats.

R27 Thank you! I'm going to read Centennial. I forgot how good those Michener novels are.

Love this book, love the movie, too

Is A Place In The Sun EXACTLY like the book?

Of course the greatest book ever is obviously "Prime Time" by Joan Collins.

[quote] Is A Place In The Sun EXACTLY like the book?

No.

[quote]R36 Of course the greatest book ever is obviously "Prime Time" by Joan Collins.

How dare you.

Well, for one thing A PLACE IN THE SUN is set 25 years later than AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY.

R35 the book has a lot more story, the film adaptation is set in a different time and while the basic story is the same it cuts out a lot. I love the movie. I wanted so badly to throw Shelley Winters out of the boat myself, I didn't blame him at all!

Woody Allen did another version with his movie Match Point. I enjoyed that one too, but I didn't feel the animosity towards Scarlett Johansson that I felt towards Shelley Winters. In Woody's version, Jonathan Rhys Myers was a combination of ambition and Evil. Not a sympathetic character. Montgomery Clift did a better job of fleshing out his character.

Loved MATCH-POINT, surely the best by far of Woody's films of the last 20-25 years. I thought the casting of Scarlett was great, she was not the predictably frumpy nag that Shelley was, yet she had to be eliminated for our hero to succeed. And unlike Monty, JRM did succeed, a totally surprise (and shockingly satisfying) ending.

I rewatched the film last year and it totally held up.

Is this a mystery book?

No. Fictionalized true crime book.

Ok if this gets more than 5 W/W I'll read it and report back on my take.

I just finished this, and began it based on OP’s high praise. It was well worth the read, and for that I thank you. However, who among us can declare the best novel ever? There are so many variables.

Don’t masturbate! You’ll have another heart attack.

R45, you should see A Place In The Sun, which is based on it

When I first glanced at the picture in the OP, I read it as "The Odor's Dresser," and thought it was a thread about Melania.

The updated version of An American Tragedy:

[quote] Huckleberry Finn has been touted for years as t he greatest American novel. I recently ordered Jim.. Percival Everett's book told from the perspective of the run away slave, Jim who shared the raft with Huck.

I hope you ordered the correct book…It’s called “James.”

There's a very good film version of An American Tragedy from 1931 directed by Joseph von Sternberg, starring Philip Holmes, Sylvia Sidney, and Frances Dee. Sidney is the best thing in the film--she plays the same role (but with a different name) that Shelley Winters plays, but instead of being a frumpy nag, she's attractive and sympathetic. It makes it all the more horrifying then when the protagonist kills her--as Pauline Kael noted in her review of "A Place in the Sun", Shelley Winters is so deeply annoying that when Montgomery Clift kills her it's more like euthanasia than a crime.

Which movie is better: An American Tragedy (1931) or A Place In The Sun (1951)?

r52, Sylvia Sidney is by far the best thing in the Von Sternberg version (1931), which is otherwise unsatisfying. The actors who plays the murderous protagonist, Philips Holmes, is interesting, but the film as a whole is too lurid and too simplistic. The story needed a subtler touch. Theodore Dreiser hated it so much that he went around the country denouncing it.

The George Stevens version from 1951 has some flaws, especially in Winters's over-the-top performance and in the fact that the Hays Code made them change the plot so that the anti-hero played by Montgomery Clift doesn't actually kill Winters's character (he plans to, but chickens out, and then she dies by accident anyway), which makes the whole plot sort of silly. But it is gorgeously filmed by George Stevens, and moves at a magnificently doomy pace, and Clift and Elizabeth Taylor were never better than in this film--their big love scene is just incredible because they have so much chemistry (he was of course gay, but they just adored each other as friends).

An American Tragedy is Ben Affleck’s haircut

Better than Sister Carrie? I think not.

Thornton Wilder's "The Eighth Day" captures the zeitgeist better.

I read "An American Tragedy" in high school and it was the first book that I didn't finish. I just remember that I gave up towards the end and thought it was getting really boring.

R57, what was the last part you read?

Are there any documentaries/tv specials about the real life story?

R29, I agree on House of Mirth.

[R58] I don't remember, that was over 40 years ago!

R61, have you seen the screen adaptations?

R62 - yes, a long time ago. I enjoyed them both, but especially the Taylor/Clift one.