The job

A book acquired a couple of months ago from the Raynes Park Platform Library, as noticed at reference 3 and which I have been reading off and on, more off than on, since. Picked up pace a few days ago and finished this morning. A book which looks to have run to lots of editions if the snap from Bing above is anything to go by. Mine is that second from the left on the second row.

The story of a country girl who, at the very beginning of the twentieth century, moves from the country to make her way in the offices of New York. Which eventually she does, eventually finding love too. We learn quite a lot about the grind of junior office life of that time, very much contemporary with that of Richard Church at the Custom House, here in the UK, as noticed most recently at reference 6. Also about the rather tacky accommodation that a lot of said juniors had to make do with. But this Lewis, while sympathetic to the plight of the workers, is also alive to the need for enterprise to drive the whole thing along. I guess he is groping, hoping, for some middle ground where both workers and capitalists get along. And it is certainly true that working conditions in offices, at least the mostly public sector ones that I came across in my time, were a lot better than those reported here.

A book which wears its century well, although it did take me a while to get going. I dare say I shall read it again - after giving BH a go to see what she makes of it.

Searching the archive for Sinclair Lewis turns up six candidates, the oldest of which takes me to reference 5. From which I deduce that I read another book by Lewis back in 2009 and that I was already confusing him with Upton Sinclair at that time. A Sinclair who gets a mention, in connection with various lefties, in the present book.

I associate from this book to 'Mildred Pierce', the mini series of which I came across some years ago, as noticed at reference 4. A story which is set a couple of decades after this one, but also features a woman who gets stuck in a marital rut, who manages to climb out of it to success, even if, in this second case, the success ends rather badly. Women doing men's work was clearly an issue which sold books in the US  in the first half of the twentieth century - and presumably here in the UK too.

PS: a little later: I have just remembered about 'Brooklyn', the much more recent novel noticed at reference 7 and 8. Just about a century newer than the present book, but which looks to cover some of the same ground. Don't think we still have a copy.

References

Reference 1: The job - Sinclair Lewis - 1917.

Reference 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Job_(novel).

Reference 3: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/03/temple-of-law.html.

Reference 4: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2024/03/cheese-time.html.

Reference 5: https://pumpkinstrokemarrow.blogspot.com/2009/02/still-trying.html.

Reference 6: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/02/the-porch.html.

Reference 7: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooklyn_(novel).

Reference 8: https://pumpkinstrokemarrow.blogspot.com/search?q=toibin.