In these early days of his career Dreiser applied himself to the task of hunting for news with the cunning and pluck of a real detective. He had the gift of finding romance in everyday existence, and when the time came to apply a meaning and a philosophy to what he saw, he turned to Herbert Spencer for guidance. In 1900 appeared “Sister Carrie,” which the censors vetoed immediately after its publication. Then appeared in slow succession “Jennie Gerhardt,” “The Financier,” the first volume of an unfinished trilogy, the second part of which was called “The Titan.” In 1915 Dreiser published “The Genius” and ten years later “An American Tragedy,” the history of a crime recounted in two huge volumes. Let us not forget Dreiser’s short stories, “Twelve Men,” “Free and Other Stories,” and “Chains.” From an artistic standpoint these are the best things that he has ever written. And then we have the autobiography of the author, “A Traveller at Forty,” and “A Book about Myself,” two self-drawn portraits of first importance to the study of Dreiser as an artist and as a man. His complete philosophy is to be found in “Hey Rub-a-Dub-Dub” and also in many pages of “A Hoosier Holiday.” It may well be doubted whether any other modern writer has ever succeeded in carrying the doctrine of realism as far as Dreiser has. It was a heroic effort on his part. He himself tells that, when he began to write, it was impossible to write realistic novels in this country. Around 1900 idealistic America was nestled too snugly in its mid-Victorian sentimentality, not to show its teeth at an American Maupassant intent upon depicting life as it is. As Dreiser ironically puts it, people were not accustomed, in those days, to “calling a spade a spade.” They wanted shock absorbers and pillows all around them. Their minds as well as their houses were all painted pink, and woe to the fanatic who tried to besmirch them with drab hues. Theoretically Americans pretended to admire Tolstoi, Flaubert, Balzac and Maupassant from a safe distance, and yet their bookshelves were loaded with the books of the mid-Victorian writers bound to match the furniture. Dreiser does not deny that the mid-Victorians had something to say about life, but they were afraid of saying too much. The great English writers of the middle nineteenth century were well aware of the vanities and lies of human existence, but they had pledged their word of honor to themselves and to the public that they would never reveal what they knew. Idealism spread a veil over it. The result was that, like William Dean Howells, American authors displayed existence only in its most smiling aspects of existence. This was the safest way not to discourage optimism. Christian people could thus be happy. They could lead quiet and respectable lives at home, rear their children in the fear of God, go to church on Sundays and ignore trouble, provided, adds Dreiser, that thieves, cheats and dogs gave them permission to do so.