Elmer Gantry is a 1927 satirical novel written by Sinclair Lewis that presents aspects of the religious activity of the United States in fundamentalist and evangelistic circles and the attitudes of the 1920s public toward it. Reverend Dr. Elmer Gantry, the protagonist, is attracted by drinking, chasing women, and making easy money (although eventually renouncing tobacco and alcohol). In the novel's fictional world, after various forays into smaller fringe churches, Gantry becomes a major moral and political force in the Methodist Church despite his hypocrisy and serial sexual indiscretions. Elmer Gantry was published in the United States by Harcourt Trade Publishers in March 1927, dedicated by Lewis to the American journalist and satirist H. L. Mencken.

Background

Biographer Mark Schorer states that while researching the book, Lewis attended two or three church services every Sunday while in Kansas City, and that, "He took advantage of every possible tangential experience in the religious community." According to others, Lewis researched the novel by observing the work of various preachers in Kansas City in his so-called "Sunday School" meetings on Wednesdays. There, he first worked with William L. "Big Bill" Stidger,<ref name=Trollinger> pastor of the Linwood Boulevard Methodist Episcopal Church. Stidger introduced Lewis to many other clergymen, thus Lewis engaged with Unitarian pastor L. M. Birkhead (an agnostic). Lewis preferred the liberal Birkhead to the conservative Stidger, and on his second visit to Kansas City, Lewis chose Birkhead as his guide. Other Kansas City ministers Lewis interviewed included Burris Jenkins, Earl Blackman, I. M. Hargett, Bert Fiske, and Robert Nelson Horatio Spencer, who was rector of Grace and Holy Trinity Church (now the cathedral of the Episcopal Diocese of West Missouri). The character of Sharon Falconer was reportedly based on events in the career of the radio evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson, who founded the Pentecostal Christian denomination known as the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel in 1927. Lewis reportedly finished the book while mending a broken leg on Jackfish Island in Rainy Lake, Minnesota. Experts have noted that George Babbitt, the namesake of one of Lewis' better-known novels, appears in Elmer Gantry (briefly, during an encounter at the Zenith Athletic Club), and that the Elmer Gantry character appears as a minor character in two later, lesser-known Lewis novels, The Man Who Knew Coolidge and Gideon Planish.

Synopsis

The novel tells the story of the young, womanizing college athlete, Elmer Gantry, who abandons an early ambition to become a lawyer. After college, he attends a Baptist seminary, and is ordained as a minister. He successfully hides sexual involvements that are prohibited, but is thrown out of the seminary before completing his bachelor of divinity because he is too drunk to appear at a church where he is supposed to preach. After several years as a traveling salesman of farm equipment, Gantry becomes a confidante of Sharon Falconer, a popular evangelist and motivational speaker who has her own traveling "road church". Gantry becomes her lover, but she and scores of individuals attending one of her meetings are killed in a catastrophic fire in her tent tabernacle, and so Gantry loses both relationship and position. After the tragedy, he briefly acts as a "New Thought" evangelist, and eventually becomes a Methodist minister. Gantry marries a local parishioner. Although he is unhappy with her sexual frigidity, he remains with her for sake of appearances. Years later, Methodist leaders award him a larger congregation in the city of Zenith. With his career and power at their peak, Gantry manipulates local, state and national political figures, resulting in police raids against bootleggers and bar patrons. Gantry's corruption and power hunger contribute to the downfall, physical injury, and even death of key people around him, including a former associate, Frank Shallard, a sincere minister who questions the moral purpose of his church. Shallard is nearly beaten to death by Gantry loyalists who are angered by perceived "atheistic" divergences from Christian teachings. Gantry's career comes close to a major scandal when one of his affairs turns out to involve a husband and wife blackmail team. Gantry is helped in avoiding potential downfall by a close friend, and via political alliances with Deacon Eversley, a powerful lawyer; and a private detective agency. A thoroughly repentant Gantry swears to abstain from his sinful proclivities. As the book closes, Gantry notices a younger woman during a closing sermon scene.

Publication history

Reception

Sinclair's Elmer Gantry was a commercial success, and was the best-selling work of fiction in America for 1927 (according to Publishers Weekly). However, on its publication, it created a public furor—it was banned in Boston and in other cities, and denounced from pulpits across the United States. Contemporary Sinclair Lewis biographer Mark Schorer notes that one cleric suggested Lewis be imprisoned for five years; others note that evangelist Billy Sunday threatened to beat him up and called him "Satan's cohort", and Lewis reportedly received an invitation to his own lynching.

Criticism

Lewis biographer Schorer notes, "The forces of social good and enlightenment as presented in Elmer Gantry are not strong enough to offer any real resistance to the forces of social evil and banality." Schorer concludes, in view of Lewis' research, that the novel satirically represents the religious activity of America in evangelistic circles and the attitudes of the 1920s toward it.

Adaptations

As of November 2007, there have been five adaptations of the novel:

Related inspired works

Shortly after the publication of Elmer Gantry, H. G. Wells published a widely syndicated newspaper article titled "The New American People", in which he largely bases his observations of American culture on Lewis's novels, including Elmer Gantry. After the 1998 play by Richard Rossi, that playwright was cast in the lead role of Elmer Gantry in a film remake of the 1960 Academy Award-winning film of the same name, slated to be directed by Amin Q. Chaudhri. Chaudhri sought investors for an initial $20 million budget, but as of this date, a remake has never been made. Rossi then began writing his own story of an Elmer Gantry-ish evangelist in a contemporary setting, which became the film Canaan Land.

Citations

Including audiovisual

Books

Chapters and articles