Tragic America, by Theodore Dreiser.
Liveright. $2.
It is difficult censuring a man who writes all for justice and good. Yet it must be said Mr. Dreiser is not profound enough. His manifestations of pain at what is going on in America don’t seem to come from such a deep place. Mr. Dreiser, in his advocacy of humanity, is too glib and at the same time splutters too much. And there is something beyond capitalism and corporations, as he sees them.
Mr. Dreiser writes of corporation presidents as if they didn’t have toothache or diabetes, and didn’t have sons who ran off with chorus girls. Deeply, there is a sad lack of simple humanity in “Tragic America.” It deals with things too much in terms of pronunciamentos and charts. Marx, with all his frightening and splendid Tightness, left out a lot; and so does Mr. Dreiser. This may sound inhuman and reactionary, but matters are much more complicated, stranger and deeper than either of them sees.
And, moreover, Mr. Dreiser (with all discounts for energy made) is just plain sloppy in his last book. His writing impedes the reader, and impeding a reader may impede justice. He writes some of the most god-awful sentences I ever saw in anything printed and bound.
So with all goodness of heart, and all love of social justice, I must say there is that to distrust and condemn in “Tragic America.” I am sorry I have to say that with all its ardor and great purpose, there is in it the tinny, the muggy, the unfair and the incomplete.
Eli Siegel.
1932