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Among LewisтАЩs funniest satires, these stories introduce the characters, themes, and techniques that would evolve into Babbitt. Each selection reflects the commercial culture of LewisтАЩs day, particularly Reason Why advertising, self-help manuals, and the business fiction of the Saturday Evening Post. The stories were published between October 1915 and May 1921 (nine in the Saturday Evening Post, four in Metropolitan Magazine, one in HarperтАЩs Magazine, and one in American Magazine).
Because some things have not changed in the American workplace since LewisтАЩs day, these highly entertaining and unflinchingly accurate office satires will appeal to the fans of Dilbert and The Drew Carey Show. In a sense, they provide lay readers with an archaeology of white-collar angst and regimentation. The horror and absurdities of contemporary corporate downsizing already existed in the office of the Progressive Era. For an audience contemplating the death of the American middle class, LewisтАЩs stories provide an important retrospective on earlier times and a preliminary autopsy on the American dream.
Appearing just in time to celebrate the seventy-fifth anniversary of the publication of Babbitt, this collection rescues LewisтАЩs best early short fiction from obscurity, provides extensive information about his formative years in advertising and public relations, and analyzes both his genius for marketing and his carefully cultivated persona as the Great Salesman of American letters.
