{"product_id":"the-rise-of-silas-lapham-paperback","title":"The Rise of Silas Lapham - Paperback","description":"\u003cdiv\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: right;\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/reportcopyrightinfringement.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\"\u003e\u003cb\u003eReport copyright infringement\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\u003cp\u003eby \u003cb\u003eWilliam Dean Howells\u003c\/b\u003e (Author), \u003cb\u003eKermit Vanderbilt\u003c\/b\u003e (Introduction by)\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWilliam Dean Howells' richly humorous characterization of a self-made millionaire in Boston society provides a paradigm of American culture in the Gilded Age. After establishing a fortune in the paint business, Silas Lapham moves his family from their Vermont farm to the city of Boston, where they awkwardly attempt to break into Brahmin society. Silas, greedy for wealth as well as prestige, brings his company to the brink of bankruptcy, and the family is forced to return to Vermont, financially ruined but morally renewed. As Kermit Vanderbilt points out in his introduction, the novel focuses on important themes in the American literary tradition: the efficacy of self-help and determination, the ambiguous benefits of social and economic progress, and the continual contradiction between urban and pastoral values. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eFor more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.\u003ch3\u003eBack Jacket\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003eSilas Lapham is a rough-hewn entrepreneur who has made his fortune in mineral paint. Socially ambitious for their daughters, Lapham and his wife encourage the suit of Tom Corey, son of an aristocratic Boston family, whose own parents are appalled by his consorting with vulgar upstarts. But which Lapham girl does Tom really love: the pretty blonde Irene or her bookish sister Penelope? As the romantic confusion is sorted out, Lapham suffers calamities that threaten both his financial and personal integrity. His rise is ultimately a moral one. The first major American novel to centre on a businessman, The Rise of Silas Lapham (1885) explores the capitalist ethos of the American Gilded Age. It is also a brilliant novel of manners that shows the comic confrontation of old wealth and new riches.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch3\u003eAuthor Biography\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eWilliam Dean Howells\u003c\/b\u003e (1837-1920) was born in Martins Ferry, Ohio. His father was a printer and newspaperman, and the family moved from town to town. Howells went to school where he could. As a boy he began learning the printer's skill. By the time he was in his teens he was setting type for his own verse. Between 1856 and 1861 he worked as a reporter for the \u003cb\u003eOhio State Journal\u003c\/b\u003e. About this time his poems began to appear in the \u003cb\u003eAtlantic Monthly\u003c\/b\u003e. His campaign biography of Abraham Lincoln, compiled in 1860, prompted the administration to offer him the consulship at Venice, a post he held from 1861 to 1865. He married Elinor Gertrude Meade, a young woman from Vermont, in 1862 Paris. On his return to the United States in 1865, Howells worked in New York before going to Boston as assistant to James T. Fields of \u003cb\u003eThe Atlantic Monthly\u003c\/b\u003e. In 1871 he became editor-in-chief of the magazine. In this position he worked with many young writers, among them Mark Twain and Henry James, both of whom became his close friends. His first novel, \u003cb\u003eTheir Wedding Journey\u003c\/b\u003e, appeared in 1872. \u003cb\u003eThe Rise of Silas Lapham\u003c\/b\u003e was serialized in \u003cb\u003eCentury Magazine\u003c\/b\u003e before it was published in book form in 1885. \u003cb\u003eA Hazard of New Fortunes\u003c\/b\u003e was published five years later. His position as critic, writer, and enthusiastic exponent of the new realism earned \u003cb\u003eWilliam Dean Howells\u003c\/b\u003e the respected title of Dean of American Letters.\u003c\/p\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eNumber of Pages:\u003c\/strong\u003e 400\u003c\/div\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eDimensions:\u003c\/strong\u003e 0.77 x 7.74 x 5.07 IN\u003c\/div\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003ePublication Date:\u003c\/strong\u003e April 28, 1983\u003c\/div\u003e\n            ","brand":"BooksCloud","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":52020198048045,"sku":"9780140390308","price":20.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0938\/3185\/6429\/files\/the-rise-of-silas-lapham-paperback-8126017.webp?v=1777439407","url":"https:\/\/ishookbooks.com\/products\/the-rise-of-silas-lapham-paperback","provider":"iShook Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}