THE CAPITALIST AS HERO IN THE AMERICAN NOVEL
Abstract
The capitalist as protagonist or as thematic type has received little critical attention, almost none in the past twenty years. The consensus of the existing criticism is that hostility or derision has generally characterized the depiction of the capitalist in the American novel. This dissertation will evaluate the heroic potential of the fictional capitalist protagonist against the novelist's own criteria for heroism. Three paradigms of the capitalist hero have governed the presentation of the hero in the American novel. The most common is that of the democratic faith. Novelists who have adopted this paradigm see the model capitalist as one who is ethical, productive, and committed to his community. The novels are Howell's Silas Lapham, Herrick's Memoirs of an American Citizen, Churchill's A Far Country, Anderson's Windy McPherson's Son, Sinclair's Oil, Fitzgerald's The Last Tycoon, Dreiser's The Bulwark, and Marquand's Sincerely Willis Wayde. A second paradigm is that of the strong man. To be considered heroic the strong man need not be ethical, nor generous. What he must do is defy a hostile environment by the force of his will and his work. These novels are Norris' The Pit, London's Burning Daylight, and Dreiser's The Financier and The Titan. A third paradigm is that of the national representative. Within this paradigm a capitalist achieves herosim by effectively representing capitalism and the democratic faith abroad. These novels are Twain's A Connecticut Yankee, James's The American, Tarkington's The Plutocrat, Lewis' Dodsworth, and Dreiser's The Stoic. Although not all protagonists meet their author's criteria for heroism, many do; most fully, Monroe Stahr in The Last Tycoon, Frank Cowperwood in The Titan, and Hank Morgan in A Connecticut Yankee. Moreover, all are endowed with the potential for heroism: each is strong, intelligent, and productive. In the last twenty-five years, however, no protagonist has achieved that status of capitalist hero. As a way of summarizing the traditional paths to heroism and the deviations from those paths found in contemporary fiction three recent novels--Heller's Catch-22, Gaddis' JR, and Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged--are evaluated.
Degree
Ph.D.
Subject Area
American literature
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