AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY

This section depicts Clyde Griffiths awaiting trial for murder. With Clyde’s tripod and camera discovered, District Attorney Mason presses for action. Samuel Griffiths secures counsel for Clyde; limited by Mr. Griffiths’ stipulations (but stimulated by the political situation), Clyde’s lawyers plot his defense. Indicted before a special term of the […]

Read more Summary and Analysis Book III: Chapters 10-19

This section deals with Clyde’s flight and capture. The coroner of Cataraqui County receives the “facts” of a double drowning. After Roberta’s bruised body is retrieved, the coroner and the district attorney discuss the political advantages of the latter’s solving a “murder.” As lawmen prepare to track down Clyde after […]

Read more Summary and Analysis Book III: Chapters 1-9

This section details Clyde’s desperation and Roberta’s death. The narrative line moves relentlessly forward. Clyde journeys to an out-of-town drugstore, but the abortion for Roberta proves ineffective. He sends her to an out-of-town physician who turns down her pleas for an abortion. Happening upon the Alden farm one day, Clyde […]

Read more Summary and Analysis Book II: Chapters 34-47

This section focuses on Clyde’s love for Sondra and his disenchantment with Roberta. After accidentally meeting Clyde one evening, Sondra is so charmed by his attention and so annoyed by Gilbert’s indifference that she arranges for Clyde to be invited into her social circle. Much to Gilbert’s disgust, his cousin’s […]

Read more Summary and Analysis Book II: Chapters 23-33

This section details Clyde’s love affair with Roberta Alden. Resolving to make good as a supervisor, Clyde nevertheless is attracted to a newly hired girl. After accidentally meeting at a lake one Sunday, the two conspire to meet again. In time, his desire and persuasion win over her desire and […]

Read more Summary and Analysis Book II: Chapters 12-22

This section depicts Clyde’s early months in Lycurgus. He begins doing menial work in his uncle’s shirt and collar factory. Accented by Gilbert Griffiths’ pejorative opinions of his country cousin, Clyde’s day-to-day reality unfolds. At a dull church social, Clyde falls in with three young pagans. Belatedly, the wealthy Griffiths […]

Read more Summary and Analysis Book II: Chapters 1-11

Having never really “traveled,” Clyde looks forward to a delightful automobile trip with Hortense and four other couples. At the Wigwam, they can eat, drink, and dance. Symbolic of the Jazz Age, the automobile is fast, easy, fun-geared, and possessed of real and illusory power; en route are drinks, gay […]

Read more Summary and Analysis Book I: Chapters 17-19

This section is atypical of Dreiser’s usual representation of day-to-day reality. Chapter 13, for example, begins with a recapitulation of the Clyde-Hortense relationship and concludes with the Clyde-and-his-mother conundrum. These episodes have a common denominator: Clyde’s money — Hortense wanting it for a coat, Mrs. Griffiths wanting it for Esta. […]

Read more Summary and Analysis Book I: Chapters 11-16

These chapters concern sixteen-year-old Clyde’s job as a bellboy at the Green-Davidson. For the first time in his life, he has money in his pockets; he can dress well and enjoy himself. Esta’s elopement is a great blow to her parents, but, for the first time, life has become exciting […]

Read more Summary and Analysis Book I: Chapters 6-10

The first five chapters of An American Tragedy depict Clyde Griffiths’ fundamentalist upbringing and describe his early jobs. From the beginning, Clyde is uneasy with his situation. Restless and dreamy, he resents his parents’ religious work in the mission house and on the city streets. He rebels against his family’s […]

Read more Summary and Analysis Book I: Chapters 1-5