Sinclair Lewis Quotes: Sources, Meanings & Themes
Browse quotations by Sinclair Lewis with named works, context notes, meanings and recurring themes.
Source identified1
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“Does truth matter—clean, cold, unfriendly truth, Max Gottlieb’s truth?”
Meaning & context
Martin questions whether his commitment to exact scientific truth is an ethical necessity or merely one personal passion among many competing human desires.
Source details
Arrowsmith, represented by Project Gutenberg #70875. The sentence is Martin Arrowsmith’s internal question during a conflict over public-health claims and scientific precision; it is fictional moral-scientific reflection, not medical advice.
Source identified2
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“He had enormous and poetic admiration, though very little understanding, of all mechanical devices.”
Meaning & context
Lewis satirizes Babbitt’s enthusiasm for modern gadgets by separating his emotional reverence for technology from any real understanding of how it works.
Source details
Babbitt, Chapter VI, section I, Project Gutenberg #1156. The narrator says Babbitt has ‘enormous and poetic admiration’ but little understanding of mechanical devices while describing his fascination with consumer technology and technical-sounding language. This is satirical fictional characterization inside Lewis's critique of boosterism and middle-class modernity, not a factual judgment about technology users generally.
Source identified3
Image design Rose Studio
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“There are two insults which no human being will endure: the assertion that he hasn’t a sense of humor, and the doubly impertinent assertion that he has never known trouble.”
Meaning & context
Lewis satirizes two kinds of self-image people defend fiercely: being able to laugh and believing their own life has contained genuine difficulty.
Source details
Main Street, Project Gutenberg #543. The narrator gives this comic generalization immediately before Carol reacts angrily to Vida’s suggestion that she has not suffered; it is satirical fiction, not a psychological finding about every person.