John J. Koblas (1942–2013)

In 1924, Sinclair Lewis persuaded his surgeon brother Claude to accompany him on a 2-month boat/canoe trip in Saskatchewan. The two would join a yearly trip by the Canadian government to distribute Treaty money to the individual Indians of the region, Claude serving in his physician capacity as well. The main part of the book consists of Claude's daily letters home to his wife Mary. Some notes of interest: Claude was evidently a man of abstemious habits, but showed a bemused tolerance of his brother Hal's (Sinclair, his middle name, was also his professional nom de plume; his family knew him as Hal or Harry, his real first name) love of booze and late night partying. True to form, the delicate Sinclair soon tired of the rugged lifestyle and departed for home, leaving Claude to continue the trek. Claude shows no resentment of this. His letters home to Mary show an unfailing love and tenderness, which seems unusual for a 50ish husband of the 1920's. The accounts of the trip itself quickly became repetitious; Claude was doubtlessly a better surgeon than a writer. Later Sinclair borrowed Claude's notes for the trip to help write his adventure novel "Mantrap", which may well be the worst of his 20-odd novels.… (más)

A selection of previously unpublished letters from Sinclair Lewis from 1923 to shortly before his death in Italy in 1950, these were a bit of a revelation. Most are to family members: His brother Claude, his beloved nieces, his father, his second wife Dorothy Thompson, a later fling, Kitty Carlisle (whom I believe is still alive as of this writing in 2008!)... the letters show a more loving, caring personality than is generally ascribed to him. I don't dispute that he was capable of being a real son of a bitch to people, even those who counted him as a friend. But I think these letters show a more complex human being, one who was capable of the gamut of emotion in a work such as "Dodsworth". I was especially moved by his condolences to his brother Claude upon the death of his beloved wife. After reading Claude's account of his and his brother's Canadian trip by way of Claude's letters home to his wife, I felt like I came to know the two of them. It was an uncommon show of tenderness for a middle-aged man of the 1920's. I was also left with a melancholy sensation after reading the last optimistic letter from Sinclair to his niece Virginia from Italy, which mentioned the pneumonia that would later fell him.… (más)

Not so much biography as an attempt to "chronicle the homeward pilgrimages" of Sinclair Lewis, the man whom Thomas Wolfe wrote of in "You Can't Go Home Again". A good look at a favorite writer of mine, flawed though he may have been, and the tug that kept drawing him to his Minnesota homeland until his ashes were laid to rest in Sauk Centre, Minnesota. Many photographs are included. This author seems to have found some personal qualities in Lewis not reflected in other biographies I've read; namely an affection and time for the children in his life. Here he is portrayed as despondent over the death of his oldest son, Wells, in WWII. In "Dorothy and Red", he scarcely seems touched by it. I think perhaps all the observers are correct in their fashion; Lewis was a complex and unhappy man who probably only really felt at home in a hotel room.… (más)