Editing Theodore Dreiser

{{Short description|American novelist and journalist (1871–1945)}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=December 2015}}
{{Infobox person
| name           = Theodore Dreiser
| image          = Theodore_Dreiser.jpg
| caption        = Theodore Dreiser, photographed by [[Carl Van Vechten]], 1933
| birth_name     = Theodore Herman Albert Dreiser
| birth_date     = {{birth date|1871|8|27|mf=y}}
| birth_place    = [[Terre Haute, Indiana]], U.S.
| death_date     = {{death date and age|1945|12|28|1871|8|27|mf=y}}
| death_place    = [[Hollywood, California]], U.S.
| occupation     = Novelist
| movement       = [[Social realism]], [[naturalism (literature)|naturalism]]
| spouse         = {{plainlist|
* {{marriage|Sara Osborne White|1898|1909|reason=sep}}
* {{marriage|Helen Patges Richardson|1944}}
}}
| children       =
| relations      = [[Paul Dresser]] (brother)
| signature = Dreiser signature.svg
}}

'''Theodore Herman Albert Dreiser''' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|d|r|aɪ|s|ər|,_|-|z|ər}};<ref name="Dictionary">{{cite web|title=Dreiser|url=http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/dreiser|website=Dictionary.com|access-date=27 June 2016}}</ref> August 27, 1871 – December 28, 1945) was an American novelist and journalist of the [[naturalism (literature)|naturalist]] school. His novels often featured main characters who succeeded at their objectives despite a lack of a firm moral code, and literary situations that more closely resemble studies of nature than tales of choice and [[agency (philosophy)|agency]].<ref name="Van Doren">{{cite book|title=American and British Literature since 1890|last=Van Doren|first=Carl|year=1925|publisher=Century Company}}</ref> Dreiser's best-known novels include ''[[Sister Carrie]]'' (1900) and ''[[An American Tragedy]]'' (1925).

==Early life==
Dreiser was born in [[Terre Haute, Indiana]], to John Paul Dreiser and Sarah Maria (née Schanab).<ref name="UPenn">Finding aid to the [http://dla.library.upenn.edu/dla/ead/ead.html?q=dreiser&id=EAD_upenn_rbml_MsColl30& Theodore Dreiser papers] at the [http://www.library.upenn.edu/ University of Pennsylvania Libraries]</ref> John Dreiser was a [[Germans|German]] immigrant from [[Mayen]] in the [[Rhine Province]] of [[Prussia]], and Sarah was from the [[Mennonite]] farming community near [[Dayton, Ohio]]. Her family disowned her for converting to [[Catholic Church|Roman Catholicism]] in order to marry John Dreiser. Theodore was the twelfth of thirteen children (the ninth of the ten surviving). [[Paul Dresser]] (1857–1906) was one of his older brothers; Paul changed the spelling of his name as he became a popular songwriter. They were raised as Catholics.

According to Daniels, Dreiser's childhood was characterized by severe poverty, and his father could be harsh. His later fiction reflects these experiences.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Daniels |first1=Howell |title=The Penguin Companion to Literature 3: USA and Latin America |date=1971 |publisher=Penguin Books Ltd. |page=77 |edition=Avenel 1981}}</ref>

After graduating from high school in [[Warsaw, Indiana]], Dreiser attended [[Indiana University Bloomington|Indiana University]] in 1889–1890 without taking a degree.<ref name="Lingeman">{{cite book|last=Lingeman|first=Richard|title=Theodore Dreiser: An American Journey|date=1993|publisher=Wiley|edition=Abridged}}</ref>

==Career==
===Journalism===
In 1892, Dreiser started work as a reporter and drama critic for newspapers in [[Chicago]], [[St. Louis]], [[Toledo, Ohio|Toledo]], [[Pittsburgh]] and [[New York City|New York]]. During this period he published his first work of fiction, ''The Return of Genius'', which appeared in the ''Chicago Daily Globe'' under the name Carl Dreiser. By 1895 he was writing articles for magazines.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Riggio, Thomas P. |title=Chronology (appended to Library of America edition of An American Tragedy) |date=2003 |publisher=Literary Classics of The United States, Inc. |location=New York |isbn=978-1-931082-310 |pages=941–943}}</ref> He authored articles on writers such as [[Nathaniel Hawthorne]], [[William Dean Howells]], [[Israel Zangwill]], and [[John Burroughs]] and interviewed public figures such as [[Andrew Carnegie]], [[Marshall Field]], [[Thomas Edison]], and [[Theodore Thomas (conductor)|Theodore Thomas]].<ref name="Hakutani">{{cite book|last1=Dreiser|first1=Theodore|editor-last=Hakutani|editor-first=Yoshinobu|title=Selected magazine articles of Theodore Dreiser : life and art in the American 1890s|date=1985|publisher=Fairleigh Dickinson University Press|location=Rutherford|isbn=0838631746|page=[https://archive.org/details/selectedmagazine00theo/page/10 10]|volume=1|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/selectedmagazine00theo/page/10}}</ref> His other interviewees included [[Lillian Nordica]], Emilia E. Barr, [[Philip Danforth Armour|Philip Armour]], and [[Alfred Stieglitz]].<ref name="Preface">{{cite book|chapter=Preface|author-last=Riggio|author-first=Thomas P.|editor-last1=Rusch|editor-first1=Frederic E.|editor-last2=Pizer|editor-first2=Donald|title=Theodore Dreiser: Interviews|date=2004|publisher=University of Illinois Press|location=Urbana|isbn=9780252029431|page=335|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=tQL7UitACW4C&pg=PR13}}</ref>

In 1895, Dreiser convinced business associates of his songwriter brother Paul to give him the editorship of a magazine called ''Ev'ry Month'', in which he published his first story, "Forgotten" a tale based on a song of his brother's titled "The Letter That Never Came".<ref name="joseph griffin">{{cite book |last1=Griffin |first1=Joseph |title=The Small Canvas An Introduction to Dreiser's Short Stories |date=1985 |publisher=Fairleigh Dickinson University Press |location=Rutherford |isbn=9780838632178 |page=21 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OBwkK8p0KiYC |access-date=25 October 2022}}</ref> Dreiser continued editing magazines, becoming editor of the women's magazine<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Davies |first=Jude |date=2017 |title=Women's Agency, Adoption, and Class in Theodore Dreiser's Delineator and Jennie Gerhardt |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/688395 |journal=Studies in American Naturalism |language=en |volume=12 |issue=2 |pages=141–170 |doi=10.1353/san.2017.0009 |s2cid=149037966 |issn=1944-6519}}</ref> ''[[The Delineator]]'' in June 1907. As Daniels noted, he thereby began to achieve financial independence.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Daniels |first1=Howell |title=The Penguin Companion to Literature 3: USA and Latin America |date=1971 |publisher=Penguin Books Ltd. |page=77}}</ref>

===Literary career===
[[File:House of the Four Pillars from the northeast.jpg|thumb|left|House of Four Pillars]]
During 1899, Dreiser and his first wife Sara stayed with Arthur Henry and his wife Maude Wood Henry at the House of Four Pillars, an 1830s [[Greek Revival architecture|Greek Revival]] house in [[Maumee, Ohio]].<ref name="Pillars">{{cite web|title= Lucas County : 2-48 House of Four Pillars|url= http://www.remarkableohio.org/index.php?/category/930|website= Remarkable Ohio|access-date= 27 June 2016}}</ref> There Dreiser began work on his first novel, ''[[Sister Carrie]]'', published in 1900.<ref name="Toledo">{{cite web|title= House of Four Pillars|url= http://toledoregionaltour.org/house-of-four-pillars|website= The Toledo Regional Tour|access-date =27 June 2016|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20160701233322/http://toledoregionaltour.org/house-of-four-pillars|archive-date= July 1, 2016|url-status= dead|df=mdy-all}}</ref> Unknown to Maude, Arthur sold a half-interest in the house to Dreiser to finance a move to New York without her.<ref name="Maude">{{cite book|chapter= Henry, Maude Wood (1873–1957) |last= Newlin |first= Keith |year= 2003|title= A Theodore Dreiser Encyclopedia|pages= 186–188 |publisher= Greenwood Publishing Group |chapter-url= https://books.google.com/books?id=Qqsc3zwrDtIC&pg=PA187 |isbn= 0-313-31680-5}}</ref>

In ''Sister Carrie'', Dreiser portrayed a changing society, writing about a young woman who flees rural life for the city (Chicago), fails to find work that pays a living wage, falls prey to several men, and ultimately achieves fame as an actress. The novel sold poorly and was considered controversial because it featured a country girl who pursues her dreams of fame and fortune through relationships with men.<ref name="Manchester" /> The book has acquired a considerable reputation. It has been called by [[Donald L. Miller]] the "greatest of all American urban novels."<ref name="Miller">{{cite book|author-link1 = Donald L. Miller |last1= Miller|first1= Donald|title= City of the Century: The Epic of Chicago and the Making of America|date= 2003 | publisher= Simon & Schuster|location= New York|isbn= 9780684831381|page=263|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=N0TNXWkIf0wC&pg=PA263 | quote = There is so much of the new metropolitan world in Sister Carrie, the greatest of all American urban novels.}}</ref>

[[File:Theodore Dreiser 2.jpg|thumb|right|Dreiser {{circa}} 1910s]]
In 1901 Dreiser's short story "Nigger Jeff" was published in ''[[Ainslee's Magazine]]''. It was based on a [[Lynching in the United States|lynching]] he witnessed in 1893.<ref name="Rice">{{cite book|last1= Rice|first1= Anne P.|title= Witnessing Lynching: American Writers Respond|date=2003|publisher=Rutgers University Press|isbn=978-0813533308|pages=151–170|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=xfSdgkSjsHUC&pg=PA151}}</ref> Dreiser's short story "[[Old Rogaum and His Theresa]]" was originally published in 1901.<ref>{{Citation
 | last = Cain | first = William E. | author-link =  | date = 2004 | title = American Literature | volume = 2 | publication-place = New York, USA | publisher = Penguin Academics | isbn = 978-0-321-11624-6 | oclc = 52728794 | url-access = registration | url = https://archive.org/details/americanliteratu00cain }}</ref>

His second novel ''[[Jennie Gerhardt]]'' was published in 1911.<ref name="Loving">{{cite book|last1= Loving|first1= Jerome|title= The Last Titan: A Life of Theodore Dreiser|date=2005|publisher=University of California Press|location= Berkeley|isbn= 9780520234819 |url= https://archive.org/details/lasttitanlifeoft0000lovi|url-access=registration|page=[https://archive.org/details/lasttitanlifeoft0000lovi/page/398 398]}}</ref>{{rp|44}} Dreiser's portrayals of young women as protagonists dramatized the social changes of urbanization, as young people moved from rural villages to cities.

Dreiser's first commercial success was ''[[An American Tragedy]]'', published in 1925. From 1892, when Dreiser began work as a newspaperman, he had begun

<blockquote>to observe a certain type of crime in the United States that proved very common. It seemed to spring from the fact that almost every young person was possessed of an ingrown ambition to be somebody financially and socially. Fortune hunting became a disease with the frequent result of a peculiarly American kind of crime, a form of "murder for money", when "the young ambitious lover of some poorer girl" found "a more attractive girl with money or position" but could not get rid of the first girl, usually because of pregnancy.<ref name="Srebnick">{{cite book|last1= Srebnick|first1= Amy Gilman|last2= Lévy|first2= René |title= Crime and Culture: An Historical Perspective|date= 2005|publisher= Ashgate|location= Burlington |isbn= 9780754623830 |page= 17|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=m3jt6mKbUK4C}}</ref></blockquote>

Dreiser claimed to have collected such stories every year between 1895 and 1935. He based his novel on details and the setting of the 1906 murder of Grace Brown by [[Chester Gillette]] in upstate New York, a crime that attracted widespread attention from newspapers.<ref name="Fishkin">{{cite book |last1= Fishkin|first1= Shelley Fisher|author-link1= Shelley Fisher Fishkin|title= From fact to fiction : journalism & imaginative writing in America|date=1988|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=New York|isbn= 9780195206388}}</ref> While the novel sold well, it also was criticized for its portrayal of a man without morals who commits a sordid murder.<ref name="Manchester" />

Though known primarily as a novelist, Dreiser also wrote short stories, publishing his first collection of 11, entitled, ''Free and Other Stories'' in 1918.

His story "My Brother Paul" was a biography of his older brother [[Paul Dresser]], who became a famous songwriter in the 1890s. This story formed the basis for the 1942 romantic movie ''[[My Gal Sal]]''.

Dreiser also wrote poetry. His poem "The Aspirant" (1929) continues his theme of poverty and ambition: a young man in a shabbily furnished room describes his own and the other tenants' dreams, and asks "why? why?" The poem appeared in ''The Poetry Quartos'', collected and printed by [[Paul Johnston (fine press printer and book designer)|Paul Johnston]], and published by Random House in 1929.

Other works include ''Trilogy of Desire'', based on the life of [[Charles Yerkes|Charles Tyson Yerkes]] (1837–1905), who became a Chicago streetcar tycoon. It is composed of ''[[The Financier]]'' (1912), [[The Titan (novel)|''The Titan'']] (1914), and ''[[The Stoic]]''. The last was published posthumously in 1947.

Dreiser often was forced to battle against censorship because his depiction of some aspects of life, such as sexual promiscuity, offended authorities and challenged popular standards of acceptable opinion.<ref name="Manchester">{{cite book |last= Manchester |first= William |author-link1= William Manchester |year= 1952|title= The Sage of Baltimore: The Life and Riotous Times of H.L. Mencken|pages= |publisher= Andrew Melrose, London, etc.}}</ref> In 1930 he was nominated for the [[Nobel Prize in Literature]] by Swedish author [[Anders Österling]], but was passed over by the [[Nobel Committee]] in favor of [[Sinclair Lewis]].<ref name="Nobel">{{cite web|title=Nomination Database Theodore Dreiser|url= https://www.nobelprize.org/nomination/archive/show_people.php?id=2537 |website= Nobel Prize.org|access-date= 27 June 2016}}
</ref>

===Political commitment===
Politically, Dreiser was involved in several campaigns defending radicals he believed victims of social injustice. These included the lynching of [[Frank Little (unionist)|Frank Little]], one of the leaders of the [[Industrial Workers of the World]], the [[Sacco and Vanzetti]] case, the deportation of [[Emma Goldman]], and the conviction of the trade union leader [[Thomas Mooney]]. In November 1931, Dreiser led the [[National Committee for the Defense of Political Prisoners]] (NCDPP) to the coalfields of southeastern [[Kentucky]] to take testimony from miners in [[Pineville, Kentucky|Pineville]] and [[Harlan, Kentucky|Harlan]] on the pattern of violence against the miners and their unions by the coal operators. The pattern of violence was known as the [[Harlan County War]].<ref name="Harlan">{{cite book|last1=Dreiser|first1=Theodore|last2=National Committee for the Defense of Political Prisoners|title=Harlan miners speak : report on terrorism in the Kentucky coal fields|date=1932|publisher=Harcourt, Brace and Co.|location=New York}}</ref>

Dreiser was a committed socialist and wrote several nonfiction books on political issues. These included ''Dreiser Looks at Russia'' (1928), the result of his 1927 trip to the [[Soviet Union]], and two books presenting a critical perspective on capitalist America, ''Tragic America'' (1931) and ''America Is Worth Saving'' (1941).<ref name="Cunningham">{{cite web|last1=Cunningham|first1=Hugo S.|title=Theodore Dreiser (1871–1945) His Friendship to the Soviet People in 1938–1941|url=http://www.cyberussr.com/rus/dreiser.html|website=Cyber-USSR|date=1999}}</ref> He praised the [[Soviet Union]] under [[Joseph Stalin]] during the [[Great Purge|Great Terror]] and the non-aggression pact with [[Adolf Hitler]]. Dreiser joined the [[Communist Party USA]] in August 1945<ref>{{cite book |editor-last1=Riggio |editor-first1=Thomas P. |title=Chronology (appended to An American Tragedy) |date=2003 |publisher=Literary Classics of The United States, Inc. |location=New York |isbn=978-1-931082-310 |page=965}}</ref> and later became the honorary president of the [[League of American Writers]]. Although less politically radical friends, such as [[H. L. Mencken]], spoke of Dreiser's relationship with communism as an "unimportant detail in his life",<ref name="Loving"/>{{rp|398}} Dreiser's biographer Jerome Loving notes that his political activities since the early 1930s had "clearly been in concert with ostensible communist aims with regard to the working class."<ref name="Loving"/>{{rp|398}}

==Personal life==
Dreiser's appearance and personality were described by [[Edgar Lee Masters]] in a poem, [https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File%3ATheodore_Dreiser%3B_America%27s_foremost_novelist_(IA_theodoredreiser00londrich).pdf&page=6 ''Theodore Dreiser: A Portrait''], published in ''[[The New York Times Review of Books]]''.<ref>{{cite book |title=Theodore Dreiser: America's foremost novelist. |publisher=John Lane Company |location=New York |pages=6–8 |url=https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File%3ATheodore_Dreiser%3B_America%27s_foremost_novelist_(IA_theodoredreiser00londrich).pdf&page=6 |access-date=8 August 2021}}</ref> 
[[File:Theodore Dreiser Caricature.jpg|thumb|Caricature of Dreiser, 1917]]

While working as a newspaperman in St. Louis, Dreiser met schoolteacher Sara Osborne White. They became engaged in 1893<ref>{{cite book |title=Riggio op cit |page=942}}</ref> and married on December 28, 1898. They separated in 1909, partly due to Dreiser's infatuation with [[Thelma Cudlipp]], the teenage daughter of a colleague, but were never formally divorced.<ref name="Newlin78">{{cite book|chapter=Cudlipp, Thelma (1892–1983)|last= Newlin|first= Keith |year=2003|title=A Theodore Dreiser Encyclopedia|pages=77–78|publisher= Greenwood Publishing Group|chapter-url= https://books.google.com/books?id=Qqsc3zwrDtIC&pg=PA78 |isbn= 0-313-31680-5}}</ref>

In 1913, he began a romantic relationship with the actress and painter [[Kyra Markham]].<ref name="Clayton">{{cite book |title=Floyd Dell, The Life and Times of An American Rebel |last=Clayton|first=Douglas|year=1994|publisher=Ivan R. Dee}}</ref><ref name="Crosse">{{cite web|last1=Crosse|first1=John|title=Edward Weston, R. M. Schindler, Anna Zacsek, Lloyd Wright, Lawrence Tibbett, Reginald Pole, Beatrice Wood and Their Dramatic Circles|url=http://socalarchhistory.blogspot.com/2012/11/edward-weston-r-m-schindler-and-anushka.html|website=Southern California Architectural History Blog|date=November 1, 2012}}</ref> In 1919, Dreiser met his cousin Helen Patges Richardson (1894–1955) with whom he began an affair.<ref name=newlin101>{{cite book|chapter=Dreiser, Helen Richardson (1894–1955)|last= Newlin|first= Keith|year=2003|title=A Theodore Dreiser Encyclopedia|page=101|publisher= Greenwood Publishing Group
|isbn= 0-313-31680-5|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Qqsc3zwrDtIC&pg=PA101}}</ref> Through the following decades, she remained the constant woman in his life, even through many more temporary love affairs (such as one with his secretary Clara Jaeger in the 1930s).<ref name="Lean">{{cite news| title= Clara Jaeger Secretary and mistress to Theodore Dreiser | author-first=Mary |author-last=Lean| work=The Independent| url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/clara-jaeger-516223.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220507/https://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/clara-jaeger-516223.html |archive-date=May 7, 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live| date=November 21, 2005}}{{cbignore}}</ref> Helen tolerated Dreiser's affairs, and they remained together until his death. Dreiser and Helen married on June 13, 1944,<ref name=newlin101/> his first wife Sara having died in 1942.<ref>{{cite news |title=Obituary: Theodore Dreiser Dies at Age of 74. |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1945/12/29/archives/theodore-dreiser-dies-at-age-of-74-author-of-american-tragedy.html |access-date=9 August 2021 |work=The New York Times |date=December 29, 1945}}</ref>

Dreiser planned to return from his first European vacation on the ''[[RMS Titanic|Titanic]]'', but was talked out of it by an English publisher who recommended he board a cheaper ship.<ref name="Daugherty">{{cite journal| title= Seven Famous People Who Missed the Titanic | author-first=Greg|author-last= Daugherty| journal=Smithsonian Magazine| url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/seven-famous-people-who-missed-the-titanic-101902418/| date=March 2012}}</ref>

Dreiser was an atheist.<ref>Cowie, Alexander, Alfred Kazin, and Charles Shapiro. "The Stature of Theodore Dreiser: A Critical Survey of the Man and His Work." ''American Literature'' 28.2 (1956): 244. Web. "he turned against his father's orthodox religion and became an atheist."</ref>

==Legacy==

===Literature===
Dreiser had an enormous influence on the generation that followed his. In his tribute "Dreiser" from ''[[Horses and Men]]'' (1923), [[Sherwood Anderson]] writes (almost repeated 1916 article<ref>Anderson, Sherwood. [https://library.brown.edu/cds/repository2/repoman.php?verb=render&view=pageturner&task=jump&id=1293024870968000&pageno=7 Dreiser], Little Review, 1916, No. 2 (April), p. 5.</ref>):

{{blockquote|Heavy, heavy, the feet of Theodore. How easy to pick some of his books to pieces, to laugh at him for so much of his heavy prose ... [T]he fellows of the ink-pots, the prose writers in America who follow Dreiser, will have much to do that he has never done. Their road is long but, because of him, those who follow will never have to face the road through the wilderness of Puritan denial, the road that Dreiser faced alone.<ref name="Baxter">{{cite book|editor-last1=Baxter|editor-first1=Charles|last=Anderson|first=Sherwood|title=Sherwood Anderson : collected stories|date=2012|publisher=Library of America|location=New York, N.Y.|isbn=978-1598532043|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5eg7t7x7QP8C&pg=PT472|access-date=28 June 2016}}</ref> }}

[[Alfred Kazin]] characterized Dreiser as "stronger than all the others of his time, and at the same time more poignant; greater than the world he has described, but as significant as the people in it,"<ref name="Kazin">{{cite book|last1=Kazin|first1=Alfred|title=On native grounds : an interpretation of modern American prose literature|date=1970|publisher=Harcourt Brace Jovanovich|location=New York|isbn=978-0156687508|page=89|edition=Fiftieth Anniversary|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gfSST-366oMC&pg=PT117|access-date=28 June 2016}}</ref> while Larzer Ziff (UC Berkeley) remarked that Dreiser "succeeded beyond any of his predecessors or successors in producing a great American business novel."<ref name="Hillstrom">{{cite book|last1=Hillstrom|first1=Kevin|last2=Hillstrom|first2=Laurie Collier|title=The industrial revolution in America|date=2005|publisher=ABC-Clio|location=Santa Barbara|isbn=978-1-85109-625-1|page=227|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fUIbzBymAjIC&pg=RA1-PA227|access-date=28 June 2016}}</ref>

Renowned mid-century literary critic [[Irving Howe]] spoke of Dreiser as ranking "among the American giants, the very few American giants we have had."<ref name="Rodden">{{cite book |title= Irving Howe and the Critics: Celebrations and Attacks|last= Rodden|first= John|year= 2005|publisher= Nebraska U.P.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ptwYkKVyx5QC&pg=PA100|page=100|isbn= 0803239335}}</ref> A British view of Dreiser came from the publisher [[Rupert Hart-Davis]]: "Theodore Dreiser's books are enough to stop me in my tracks, never mind his letters—that slovenly turgid style describing endless business deals, with a seduction every hundred pages as light relief. If he's the great American novelist, give me the [[Marx Brothers]] every time."<ref name="Lyttelton">{{cite book|last1=Lyttelton|first1=George|editor-last=Hart-Davis|editor-first=Rupert|title=The Lyttelton Hart-Davis letters : correspondence of George Lyttelton and Rupert Hart-Davis.|volume=4|date=1982|publisher=John Murray|location=London|isbn=978-0-7195-3941-1|chapter=Letter dated August 30, 1959}}</ref> The literary scholar [[F. R. Leavis]] wrote that Dreiser "seems as though he learned English from a newspaper. He gives the feeling that he doesn't have any native language".<ref name="Mackillop">{{cite book|author-last=Leavis|author-first= F. R.|editor-last1=Mackillop|editor-first1=Ian|editor-last2=Storer|editor-first2=Richard|title=F.R. Leavis essays and documents|date=2005|publisher=Continuum|location=London|isbn=1847144578|page=77|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IYHoy8YohAIC&pg=PA77}}</ref>

One of Dreiser's strongest champions during his lifetime, [[H. L. Mencken]],<ref name="Mencken">{{cite book|last1=Riggio|first1=Thomas P.|title=Dreiser-Mencken letters : the correspondence of Theodore Dreiser & H.L. Mencken, 1907-1945|date=1986|publisher=University of Pennsylvania Press|location=Philadelphia|isbn=0812280083|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/dreisermenckenle01drei}}</ref> declared "that he is a great artist, and that no other American of his generation left so wide and handsome a mark upon the national letters. American writing, before and after his time, differed almost as much as biology before and after [[Charles Darwin|Darwin]]. He was a man of large originality, of profound feeling, and of unshakable courage. All of us who write are better off because he lived, worked, and hoped."<ref name="Riggio">{{cite web|last1=Riggio|first1=Thomas P.|title=Biography of Theodore Dreiser|url=http://www.library.upenn.edu/collections/rbm/dreiser/tdbio.html|website=University of Pennsylvania|publisher=Penn Libraries|access-date=27 June 2016}}</ref>

Dreiser's great theme was the tremendous tensions that can arise among ambition, desire, and social mores.<ref name="Cassuto">{{cite book|editor-last1=Cassuto|editor-first1=Leonard|editor-last2=Eby|editor-first2=Clare Virginia|title=The Cambridge companion to Theodore Dreiser|date=2004|publisher=Cambridge university press|location=Cambridge|isbn=9780521894654|page=9|url=http://www.cambridge.org/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=9780521894654&ss=exc}}</ref>

===Academia===
Dreiser Hall, erected 1950 on the [[Indiana State University]] campus in Terre Haute, Indiana, houses the University's Communications Programs, Student Media ([[WISU]]), Sycamore Video and "The Sycamore" (annual yearbook), classroom and lecture space as well as a 255-seat proscenium theater. It was named for Dreiser in 1966.

Dreiser College, at [[Stony Brook University]] located in Stony Brook, New York, is also named after him.

In 2011, Dreiser was inducted into the Chicago Literary Hall of Fame.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://chicagoliteraryhof.org/inductees/profile/theodore-dreiser |title=Theodore Dreiser |date=2011 |website=Chicago Literary Hall of Fame |language=en |access-date=2017-10-08}}</ref>

==Works==
{{Library resources box|by=yes|onlinebooksby=yes|viaf= 4944366}}

===Fiction===
*''[[Sister Carrie]]'' (1900)
*''[[Jennie Gerhardt]]'' (1911)
*''[[The Financier]]'' (1912)
*''[[The Titan (novel)|The Titan]]'' (1914)
*''[[The "Genius" (novel)|The "Genius"]]'' (1915)
*''Free and Other Stories'' (1918)
*''[[An American Tragedy]]'' (1925)
*''[[Chains: Lesser Novels and Stories]]'' (1927)
*''[[The Bulwark (novel)|The Bulwark]]'' (1946)
*''[[The Stoic]]'' (1947)

===Drama===
*''Plays of the Natural and the Supernatural'' (1916)
*''The Hand of the Potter'' (1918), first produced 1921

===Poetry===
*''Moods: Cadenced and Declaimed'' (New York: Boni & Liveright, 1926), 127 poems in a strictly limited edition of 550 numbered copies signed by the author, of which 535 were for sale; revised and enlarged as ''Moods: Philosophical and Emotional (Cadenced and Declaimed)'' (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1935)

===Nonfiction===
*''The Camera Club of New York. Ainslee's. Vol. 4, pp. 325–335 '' (1899)
*''A Traveler at Forty'' (1913)
*''A Hoosier Holiday'' (New York: John Lane Company, 1916)
*''Twelve Men'' (New York: Boni & Liveright, 1919)
*''[[Hey Rub-a-Dub-Dub|Hey Rub-a-Dub-Dub: A Book of the Mystery and Wonder and Terror of Life]]'' (New York: Boni & Liveright, 1920)
*''A Book About Myself'' (1922); republished (unexpurgated) as ''Newspaper Days'' (New York: Horace Liveright, 1931)
*''The Color of a Great City'' (New York: Boni & Liveright, 1923)
*''Dreiser Looks at Russia'' (New York: Horace Liveright, 1928)
*''My City'' (1929)
*''A Gallery of Women'' (1929)
*''Tragic America'' (New York: Horace Liveright, 1931)
*''Dawn'' (New York: Horace Liveright, 1931)
*''America Is Worth Saving'' (New York: Modern Age Books, 1941)
*''Notes on Life,'' edited by Marguerite Tjader and John J. McAleer (University of Alabama Press; 1974)
*''An Amateur Laborer,'' edited with an Introduction by Richard W. Dowell (University of Pennsylvania Press; 1983) 207 pages
*''Theodore Dreiser: Political Writings,'' edited by Jude Davies (University of Illinois Press; 2011) 321 pages

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Additional reading==
*Cassuto, Leonard and Clare Virginia Eby, eds. ''The Cambridge Companion to Theodore Dreiser''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004.
*Loving, Jerome. ''The Last Titan: A Life of Theodore Dreiser''. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005.
*Riggio Tom and Morgan, Speer, ''The Total Stranger''. The Missouri Review 10.3 (1987): 97–107.

==External links==
{{commons category}}
{{wikiquote}}
{{wikisource author}}
* {{StandardEbooks|Standard Ebooks URL=https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/theodore-dreiser}}
* {{Gutenberg author |id=130| name=Theodore Dreiser}}
* {{Internet Archive author |sname=Theodore Dreiser}}
* {{Librivox author |id=2227}}
* {{find a Grave|299}}
* {{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20121011211221/http://www.dreisersociety.org/ The International Theodore Dreiser Society]}}
* Finding aid to the [http://dla.library.upenn.edu/dla/ead/ead.html?q=dreiser&id=EAD_upenn_rbml_MsColl30& Theodore Dreiser papers] at the [http://www.library.upenn.edu/ University of Pennsylvania Libraries], [[Philadelphia]], Pennsylvania
* [http://www.library.upenn.edu/collections/rbm/dreiser/ DreiserWebSource] at [[University of Pennsylvania]] Library, [[Philadelphia]], Pennsylvania
* [https://web.archive.org/web/19981205191707/http://xroads.virginia.edu/%7EHYPER/DREISER/carrie.html Sister Carrie] from American Studies at the University of Virginia.
* [https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/8987.Theodore_Dreiser Theodore Dreiser at Goodreads]
* [http://www.librarything.com/catalog/theodoredreiser Dreiser's personal library] cataloged on [[LibraryThing]]
* [http://www.c-span.org/video/?165660-1/writings-theodore-dreiser "Writings of Theodore Dreiser"] from [[C-SPAN]]'s ''[[American Writers: A Journey Through History]]''
* [https://www.loc.gov/rr/rarebook/coll/tc.html "T.C."] Collection: Early works of Theodore Dreiser collected by Walter N. Tobriner and presented to Roger S. Cohen, (115 titles). From the Rare Book and Special Collections Division at the [[Library of Congress]]
* [https://archives-manuscripts.dartmouth.edu/repositories/2/resources/1527 Theodore Dreiser Letters] at Dartmouth College Library
* [https://findingaids.library.columbia.edu/ead/nnc-rb/ldpd_4078714 Finding aid to Theodore Dreiser letters and manuscripts, 1897–1939, at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.]
* [[hdl:10079/fa/beinecke.dreiser|Theodore Dreiser Collection]]. Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library.

{{Dreiser}}

{{Authority control}}

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