Theodore Dreiser: An American Tragedy 
Theodore Dreiser (August 27, 1871-December 28, 1945) was born in Terre Haute, Indiana, and baptized as Herman Theodore Dreiser. He was the ninth of ten surviving children (three others died as infants) of Säräh Schanab and Johann Dreiser. http://www.library.upenn.edu/collections/rbm/dreiser/tdbio.html American writer in the Naturalism movement (a pessimistic form of Realism).
Dreiser's family was poor, and he soon saw a profound difference between the promise and the reality of American life. This realization was a major source of Dreiser's discontent and an important influence on his works.
Dreiser attended Indiana University for a year. In the 1890's, he worked as a newspaperman in Chicago and St. Louis. By 1907, he was the successful editor of the very sort of woman's magazine whose sentimentality and superficiality he despised.
Dreiser's first novel, SISTER CARRIE, was partly based on the experiences of one of his sisters. SISTER CARRIE is the story of Carrie Meeber, a poor girl alone in Chicago. She lives with a traveling salesman and then runs off to New York with George Hurstwood, a prosperous married man. Hurstwood's fortunes decline, and he becomes a bum and commits suicide. Carrie finds success, but not happiness, as an actress.
Dreiser wrote JENNIE GERHARDT (1911), another novel of desire and fate. However, his reputation was assured with the publication of THE FINANCIER (1912), the most purely naturalistic of his works. It is the story of an industrial tycoon who claws his way to great power. Dreiser intended the novel as the beginning of a "Trilogy of Desire." But the second volume, THE TITAN (1914), was a failure, and the third volume, THE STOIC, was not published until two years after his death.
AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY (1925) is the finest of Dreiser's books. It concerns a weak young man who is executed for the murder of his pregnant girl friend. Again, Dreiser did not condemn his villain, but the amoral society that produced and destroyed him.
Dreiser's family was poor, and he soon saw a profound difference between the promise and the reality of American life. This realization was a major source of Dreiser's discontent and an important influence on his works.
Dreiser attended Indiana University for a year. In the 1890's, he worked as a newspaperman in Chicago and St. Louis. By 1907, he was the successful editor of the very sort of woman's magazine whose sentimentality and superficiality he despised.
Dreiser's first novel, SISTER CARRIE, was partly based on the experiences of one of his sisters. SISTER CARRIE is the story of Carrie Meeber, a poor girl alone in Chicago. She lives with a traveling salesman and then runs off to New York with George Hurstwood, a prosperous married man. Hurstwood's fortunes decline, and he becomes a bum and commits suicide. Carrie finds success, but not happiness, as an actress.
Dreiser wrote JENNIE GERHARDT (1911), another novel of desire and fate. However, his reputation was assured with the publication of THE FINANCIER (1912), the most purely naturalistic of his works. It is the story of an industrial tycoon who claws his way to great power. Dreiser intended the novel as the beginning of a "Trilogy of Desire." But the second volume, THE TITAN (1914), was a failure, and the third volume, THE STOIC, was not published until two years after his death.
AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY (1925) is the finest of Dreiser's books. It concerns a weak young man who is executed for the murder of his pregnant girl friend. Again, Dreiser did not condemn his villain, but the amoral society that produced and destroyed him.