Babbitt (Criticism)

Criticism

Scott Trudell

Trudell is a freelance writer with a bachelor's degree in English literature. In the following essay, Trudell discusses the role that Babbitt's homoerotic relationship with Paul Riesling plays in Lewis's novel. Babbitt is primarily a satire that exposes the emptiness and discontent in the life of its main character, but it is not always clear that Babbitt's life has no value or meaning. From his occasional pleasant drive to his self-satisfaction with his rise in the social hierarchy, Babbitt sometimes revels in and enjoys his conformity. He has moments of bonding with his children, particularly with Ted, although the children can seldom hold his interest. Although he finds his wife distasteful, he sometimes feels a passionless affection for her. And the various aspects of his rebellion, such as his relationship with Tanis, are initially very exciting until they are revealed to be nothing more than unsuccessful attempts at escapism.

All other relationships fade, however, in comparison to Babbitt's one worthwhile relationship, with the one person around whom Babbitt feels truly and consistently happy. Paul Riesling is not only Babbitt's best friend; he represents all that is genuine and valuable in Babbitt's life, a fact that Babbitt himself acknowledges after Paul is given a three-year prison sentence: "Babbitt returned to his office to realize that he faced a world which, without Paul, was meaningless." With Paul "dead" to him, Babbitt loses the only person around whom he can express his real thoughts and be silent and calm, and he can no longer face his family or the business world. Babbitt is willing to perjure himself for Paul, ignoring the effect this would have on his career and social status. Paul's imprisonment sparks a major mid-life rebellion in which Babbitt overturns nearly all of his beliefs and habits to escape his now "meaningless" existence.

Lewis is careful to emphasize that Paul is a misfit whose sensitivity, lack of business acumen, and inability to endure his wife are incompatible with the standardized business world of Zenith. Indeed, the satirist seems eager to stress that Paul represents the genuine side of Babbitt that cannot conform to his outward life. Just as Zilla is a foil (a character whose purpose is to reveal something about another character) that emphasizes the vain, insecure, and nagging aspects of Myra that repel her husband and do not fit into Zenith domestic life, Paul is a foil for his best friend. Lewis makes this point most overtly after Babbitt's visit to Paul in prison:

Babbitt knew that in this place of death Paul was already dead. And as he pondered on the train home something in his own self seemed to have died: a loyal and vigorous faith in the goodness of the world, a fear of public disfavor, a pride in success.

Paul does not embody these characteristics, but he has always been the one to reveal them in Babbitt. So, in order to drive the plot and test Babbitt's character, Lewis imprisons him and removes him from Babbitt's struggle. Paul is an expendable device in Lewis's satire, which needs to demonstrate that Zenith has no place for him, that Paul's genuineness, his "moodiness, his love of music," and his inability to conform are incompatible with Lewis's satirical vision. The author seems intent on refuting the possibility of a meaningful relationship for someone like Babbitt, although this is initially a realistic possibility. As D. J. Dooley observes in his book The Art of Sinclair Lewis, it is after Paul's imprisonment that this possibility is extinguished, the plot begins to fail, and the story-line loses its vitality:

But in the melodramatic story of how Babbitt, now a hero, battles his former friends, now villains, the characters are simple and unreal, the plot is full of improbabilities, and Lewis does not come close to pulling it off.

This is because Lewis has abandoned Babbitt's central hope and purpose, turning the struggle of his main character into a desperate but ultimately futile attempt at escapism. The futility of the plot becomes particularly clear when Babbitt fails to enjoy his time in Maine; whereas before the outdoors had been his only truly calm and completely happy moment, without Paul: "He was lonelier than he had ever been in his life."

As is clear from Babbitt's pursuit of women around the same time, this loneliness is for both a friend and a lover. Babbitt's wife sometimes makes him feel less lonely, but he has never loved her and finds her completely repulsive sexually. Tanis also makes a brief dent in Babbitt's loneliness, but their affair is (like her) superficial and desperate, and it is shortly extinguished. Indeed, Babbitt never seems to be genuinely attracted to women; even his "fairy child" is a completely unconvincing fantasy, as Virginia Woolf notes in her 1947 essay, "American Fiction." With Paul, on the other hand, he feels "a proud and credulous love passing the love of women," and their relationship is far more erotically charged than any of Babbitt's encounters with women.

There are a number of hints of this homoerotic aspect of Paul and Babbitt's relationship. During their trip to Maine, for example, where they need to abandon their wives and "just loaf by ourselves and smoke and cuss and be natural," this idea of the "natural" comes to a climax with the reaction one might expect from a taboo erotic encounter: "The shame of emotion overpowered them." And, when Babbitt returns to Maine, he has a desire for male affection, to "be a regular man, with he-men like Joe Paradise — gosh!" that culminates in a vision of Paul playing his violin at the end of Babbitt's canoe. Perhaps the most convincing example, however, comes as Babbitt is considering Paul at the only moment in which he considers the carnal and sexual aspects of his otherwise quite frigid fairy girl:

But he did know that he wanted the presence of Paul Riesling; and from that he stumbled into the admission that he wanted the fairy girl — in the flesh. If there had been a woman whom he loved, he would have fled to her, humbled his forehead on her knees.

There is no woman Babbitt loves; his only true love is a man in prison. The end of chapter 6 reveals that even the passionless and insubstantial love of Babbitt's marriage is an extension of his romantic feelings for Paul. Myra became a replacement for Paul's companionship while Paul was "bespelled by Zilla Colbeck," and Myra's role of ineffectively substituting for Paul is underscored by the fact that she is Paul's second cousin. Lewis is (wittingly or unwittingly) emphasizing that his novel is describing a homoerotic love story.

Unfortunately for Babbitt, this story comes to an abrupt end in chapter 21. It is at this point that, in the novelist's struggle between his satirical goals and his desire to develop the dramatic conflicts of his characters, the love story is sacrificed to the demands of Lewis's satire. Genuine homoerotic love is the central aspect of Babbitt's search for meaning, but it is certainly not something that Lewis is willing to accept into his satirical agenda. Just as Paul is a misfit who has no place in the cultureless and standardized Zenith, Babbitt and Paul's love must be eradicated from a city that does not tolerate deviations from passionless and duty-bound marriage.

There is seldom any love at all in Zenith, either among the married Boosters and Realtors who cheat on their wives and pay no attention to them, or among Tanis's escapist and insincere "Bunch." The only instances of passion, aside from that of Babbitt and Paul, are the relationships of Babbitt's children, particularly of Ted and Eunice Littlefield. So it is no coincidence that Ted's bonding with his father and the escalation of his relationship with Eunice begin to develop just before Paul shoots Zilla. Lewis requires the developing dramatic energy of Paul and Babbitt's relationship to move along his reader and power his satire, but it is too vivid and taboo to follow to its natural destination. Not only is a homoerotic relationship unacceptable in Zenith, it is unacceptable to Lewis and to his readers. It is as if, recognizing that the course of Paul and Babbitt's relationship as the central dramatic energy of the novel was becoming too dangerous and developing too fully, Lewis forcefully steers the plot towards the safer Ted.

Ted is not too safe; his dislike of college and his elopement are edgy enough to create a potential dramatic conflict against the empty, satirical Zenith. And Babbitt is shown to enjoy a sort of genuine, though compromised, passion by proxy at the end of the novel: he allows Ted to follow his dreams although he cannot follow his own. Despite the fact that it does not ring true or genuinely address Babbitt's struggle, Lewis manages to power his satire to the end of the novel with this secondary dramatic action.

After Lewis abandons the central conflict of the novel and imprisons its only real solution, however, his novel loses steam. As discussed above, the plot flattens and dies after Paul's imprisonment, and Babbitt's relationship with Ted fails to convince or even interest many readers and critics. Lewis has crafted a thorough and compelling satire, but his suppression and abandonment of the main love story leaves his famous main character unhappy, unchanged, and undeveloped. It sucks the life out of the novel and leaves the reader wondering whether, had Lewis not succumbed to a cheap plot trick, Babbitt might have fought a successful battle for meaning.

Source:

Scott Trudell, Critical Essay on Babbitt, in Novels for Students, Gale, 2004.

"With Paul, on the other hand, he feels 'a proud and credulous love passing the love of women,' and their relationship is far more erotically charged than any of Babbitt's encounters with women."