The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1927-03-30
SINCLAIR LEWIS GRIMY TRADE

@ 1NCLAIR LEWIS is young author who
started out to be pleasant romanticist and
has turned-very profitably for himself to
the business of what is called realism. His most
recent work iA good example of how far what lit
erary critics call realism is from reality.
In ELMER Gantry" this bright young man is
undertaking the churches just as he muckraked
medicine in "Arrowsmith," the American small town
in "Main Street" and the American large town in
"Babbitt"
The methed of this business which has SO pro-
fitaby engaged the talents of this Minnesota author
is very wildly illustrated in ELMER Gantry"
First he gathered with his trained muckrake
all the salacious episodes and nasty traits that he
could find about scattered individual preachers.
Then he nodded the material thus gathered into
figure called ELMER Gantry," hero with the NOR
ais of monkey; and he calls this figure typical
clergyman.
By the same process he took all that is worst
and perverted all that is BEST in the American small
town, the American city and the medical profession
and then he called the synthetic result the typical
small town, the typical large city and the typical
doctor.
The Pollyanna school at its most cloying stage
of sweetness does not distort the truth so outrag-
eously does this socalled realism lately so much
in fashion
Many will read "Elmer Gantry" because the
intelligentsia will declare it to be wonderful Many
Will reaQ IL because they THINK IL the thing to do.
Many will read it because having waded with great
difficulty through it's predecessors with some relish
for the morses of scandal about poor mankind they
provide, they have become the victims of an ac-
quired taste for this sort of thing
And some, at least, will not read it at all be-
cause they do not wish to witness young smart
Aleck whose only god is Mencken ibellng the most
precious things in the lives of millions of people.
The most that this book can do, besides making
never again will have to turn out potboilers for
the Saturday Evening Post which pays so ridicu-
lousy well for them is to contribute little
confusion to a situation that must make the devil
hilariousy happy.
This situation is created by these facts:
First that those who profess to have no relig-
ion and to despite it have built up a concept of
religion that nobody really holds at least any more,
and spend their time ridiculing this sham figure
that no longer exists if it ever did exist.
Second that many of those who profess to have
religion have built up false concept of the other
fellows religion, and scorning and hating some
thing that is far from being true picture of
the other fellows creed as ELMER Gantry" is from
being photograph of any clergyman, not to speak
of the average clergyman, and his creed.
Anybody who contributes to the business of
creating false pictures of religion of religions
may be getting reputation for smartness, and he
may be making great deal of money; but he isn't
contributing to peace and harmony and good will
among men but to discord and confusion.
And therefore he is engaged in very grimy
trade that is somewhat baser than that of the man
who gets rich selling putrid food made palatable by
poisonous drugs.-Duuth Herald