Free Air

Sinclair Lewis (1885-1951) was an American novelist and playwright who, in 1930, became the first American to win the Nobel Prize for literature. His first published book was Hike and the Aeroplane, which appeared in 1912 under the pseudonym Tom Graham, followed by Our Mr Wrenn (1914). Main Street (1920) was his first major commercial success. It was initially awarded the 1921 Pulitzer Prize for literature, but was rejected by the Board of Trustees. Babbitt (1922) is a satire on American values, its main theme is the power of conformity and the vacuity of American life. Lewis was awarded the Pulitzer Prize again in 1926 - which he rejected - for Arrowsmith (1925), a novel about an idealistic doctor. Elmer Gantry (1927) was the story of an opportunistic evangelist. His last great work was It Can't Happen Here (1935), a speculative novel about the election of a Fascist President.