American · 1885–1951
Sinclair Lewis won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1930—the first American laureate—for "his vigorous and graphic art of description and his ability to create, with wit and humour, new types of characters." "Main Street" (1920), "Babbitt" (1922), and "Arrowsmith" (1925) satirized American conformity and provincialism. Lewis declined the Pulitzer Prize. His reputation has fluctuated, but his critique of American boosterism remains sharp.