Genius

by Theodore Dreiser Narrated by Richard Kilmer

Overview

The only figure of literary repute who ever rated The Genius" as first among the novels of Theodore Dreiser was Theodore Dreiser," literary historian Larzer Ziff observed. His fifth published novel, The "Genius" was actually the third novel Dreiser began work on and, as his most autobiographical work, remained the novel closest to his heart. He worked on it in stages over a four-year period. The credit he felt he deserved (and did not receive) for his honesty about sexual urges and damaged relationships and his original publisher's decision not to stand by the novel in the face of criticism contributed to his lifelong feeling that the book had never been given its due. After An American Tragedy, it is his longest book; the final draft ran to over 700 pages in a close-set type. While the protagonist of the book is in many ways a portrait of its author, Dreiser also loosely based Eugene Witla on some of the painters, artists working in an Ashcan realist style, whom he knew in New York at the time and whose studios he visited. The most likely candidate for a model is Everett Shinn, who painted urban scenes of the kind attributed to Witla and who was known as a promiscuous man.The novel is divided intro three sections: "Youth," "Struggle," and "Revolt." In Book I, Eugene Witla (like Sister Carrie, in Dreiser's earlier novel) escapes the confines of the small town in Illinois where he has been raised to make his way in Chicago. There he studies painting at the Chicago Art Institute and enjoys the excitement of the city and his first sexual experiences. He becomes engaged to a young woman, Angela Blue, with whom he is intimate before their marriage but, at all times, he finds it difficult to remain faithful. A life based on monogamy seems beyond him. In Book II, Eugene and Angela move to New York City, where he makes a name for himself in the art world as an urban realist but finds his marriage with the increasingly conventional Angela painfully limiting. They travel to Europe, he suffers a breakdown, and they return to New York where Eugene attempts to make a better living in the advertising world. Book III chronicles the deterioration of Eugene and Angela's marriage as he begins an affair with Suzanne Dale. (wikipedia)

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

"This edition provides an opportunity to follow in close compass Dreiser's process of revision. It captures his point of view at a transitional moment in his career, and it sheds light on his subsequent work."—Times Literary Supplement

"This edition provides an opportunity to follow in close compass Dreiser's process of revision. It captures his point of view at a transitional moment in his career, and it sheds light on his subsequent work."—Times Literary Supplement

"This is a superb edition: skillfully edited, fully annotated, usefully contextualized. We have been given a new and almost entirely unknown version of The Genius—the text as originally conceived by Dreiser. It now demands our attention and close study."—James L. W. West III, general editor of the Cambridge Fitzgerald Edition

"The Genius is one of the most overlooked and underrated of Dreiser's novels, yet it is arguably the key book for students of the writer, offering abundant materials for an understanding of the tensions between art and business and between romance and realism. It is also one of the finest portraits of marriage—and of the passions of marital frustration—in all of literature, as well as an exploration of the supposed sexual privileges of genius. Clare Eby's presentation of this earlier and previously unpublished Genius is a triumph of textual and interpretive scholarship, offering in its accompanying essays and apparatus a meticulous consideration of the similarities and differences between the two texts as well as copious explanatory notes. A great addition to Dreiser scholarship, this original version reminds us again of the fascinating evolution of Dreiser's powerful imagination."—Miles Orvell, author of The Real Thing: Imitation and Authenticity in American Culture, 1880-1940

"A first-rate piece of textual scholarship that provides a vital and valuable new perspective on an important novel."—Leonard Cassuto, Fordham University

Product Details

BN ID:	2940169277913
Publisher:	LibriVox
Publication date:	08/25/2014
Sales rank:	445,159

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