Jennie Gerhardt is a naturalist novel documenting the social descent and moral isolation of a young woman from a poor German-immigrant family in the late nineteenth-century Midwest. After becoming pregnant by Senator Brander, who dies before they can marry, Jennie enters a long-term, secret domestic arrangement with Lester Kane, the wealthy heir to a manufacturing fortune. The narrative focuses on the rigid class hierarchies and economic pressures that prevent their union from attaining legal or social legitimacy. Dreiser details how family inheritance laws and the threat of social ostracization force Kane to choose between his financial status and his personal devotion to Jennie.
Readers interested in the historical realities of urban poverty and the restrictive social codes of the Gilded Age read this book to understand how environmental circumstances dictate individual fate. It attracts those who value detailed accounts of labor, class mobility, and the precarious position of women in early industrial America. The reader walks away with a clear perspective on how institutional forces and material wealth exert more control over human relationships than personal character or romantic intent.
Inward-looking and thought-provoking; a moderate read.
Best for readers like The Mindful Reader. Which reader are you?
- Published
- 1911
- Language
- EN
