Working as a bellhop for a luxurious hotel, all seems to go well until he gets caught in a group of careless kids-trouble. He eventually flees Kansas City, his hometown, after a little girl is killed in a car accident with which he was involved. He takes up a job in a fancy Chicago club, where me meets his rich and successful Uncle, Samuel Griffiths, who owns a collar business in New York-more trouble. Clyde finds work in his uncle's factory, where he falls in love with and impregnates a girl, Roberta Alden, who works for him, despite the rule that no supervisor is permitted to become involved with his workers.
This is when the real trouble begins for Clyde, as he falls in love with another girl, Sondra Finchley, just after he gets the news of Roberta's pregnancy. Sondra is certainly no worker, she is the daughter of a rich family in the wealthy town of Lycurgus, new York. Sondra, who becomes infatuated with Clyde despite her mother's advice not to become involved with a poor boy, represents the world of success, happiness, freedom and wealth to which Clyde desperately aspires. Sondra is the answer to Clyde's dreams, she is, as Dreiser puts it, a girl with everything asking Clyde for nothing, and Roberta is a girl with nothing asking Clyde for everything-not least among these things is marriage. The only solution Clyde's young mind concocts is murder-yes, murder. He takes Roberta out on a boat and causes her to drown, but he leaves a trail of suspicious clues behind, and after an emotional and perhaps unfair trial, he is sentenced to death at 21 years of age.
Thus, Clyde is so star-struck by the attraction of Sondra and her comfortable world that he sacrifices his life in pursuit of it. An American Tragedy is as emotionally difficult to endure as King Lear or Othello. Dreiser is not kidding; this is most certainly a tragedy in its most severe and harrowing form. An American tragedy stands as an American masterpiece along with such epics as Grapes of Wrath, Patterson or Howl. It is difficult to think that even one reader would not come away from this book without a more compassionate heart
Despite that, few will recognize Clyde as a classical "Tragic Hero." His problems don't come from some flaw in his noble nature - he doesn't seem to have a noble nature at all, and his worst flaw looks too much like a lack of a moral conscience to make him ever seem very heroic. The real tragic hero here is America herself. The nobility of Dreiser's America shines through his loving descriptions of her hardworking people, her natural beauty, and the dreams of success that people like Clyde pursue. But we also see the flaws manifest in the poor lives of people like Clyde's family, the terrible choices forced on Clyde and Roberta, and the travesty of justice at Clyde's trial.
The book has a few flaws of its own. Some of the dialog is a bit odd - and not just because of idiom changes in the past century; there are some sections that might have been edited out to move the action along faster, and sometimes Clyde's flaws do make it difficult to sympathize with him. Nevertheless, the characters are interesting, the society they live in is interesting, and the book (for the most part) sucks you in and holds your attention.
To make sense out of the money amounts, remember than inflation from then (~1900) to now (2001) amounts to about a factor of 20, so if you think of the $100 fur coat as a $2000 coat, you'll have about the right idea. And you'll understand why a $13 lunch seemed so extravagant.
Clyde Griffiths is a young man with ambition who longs for a better life than that of his parents, who are street missionaries. First he flees his Kansas City home after getting into some minor trouble. By chance, Clyde meets his wealthy uncle by chance and secures a job in the family collar factory in New York State.
Clyde, thanks to the family name, is quickly brought into the social scene of his new hometown. He develops a relationship with a co-worker (Roberta) but as soon as a young lady of wealth and social status (Sondra)shows favor to him, Clyde looses interest in Roberta. The affair with Roberta produces a pregnancy and the situation spins out of Clyde's control. Eventually Clyde's self interests outweigh his sense of right and wrong, resulting in tragedy.
From the first few pages you get a sense that Clyde's ambitions will eventually be his undoing. Drieser leaves very little to the reader's imagination as he weaves you through 800 pages of intricate detail. At the end Clyde comes to terms with his deeds and confesses his sins to both GOD and himself.