356 Dos Passos, John
the truly tragic effect of capitalism on society. Only
within such an inherently alienating context can
Janey regard Moorehouse as an idol, not in spite
of but precisely because of Moorehouse’s “ability”
to regard World War I not as a horrific historical
event but as a potential for creating profit out of the
destruction of Europe. In this way, Janey stands for a
problem that for Dos Passos characterizes U.S. soci-
ety as a whole, a society that has traded in the ideal
of caring for others for the ideal of making a profit.
Mathias Nilges
Gender in the U.S.A. trilogy
The so-called 1920s modern woman, with her
bobbed hair, loose clothing, low necklines, desire to
work, and newfound sexual freedom, embodies the
cultural shifts explicit in John Dos Passos’s U.S.A.
trilogy, which effectively describes what life was like
in a time of burgeoning capitalism. Exploring the
modern woman as a metaphor for this great cultural
shift illuminates Dos Passos’s political concerns.
Broadly speaking, the modern woman of the
1920s was less interested in the traditional role of
wife and mother than she was in her own intel-
lectual, financial, emotional, and sexual pursuits,
and her behavior frequently reflected a challenge
to the status quo. The drastic political change that
accompanied women’s right to vote made many of
them want social change as well: They craved their
own style, their own money, their own jobs. Modern
men, many of whom had just returned from World
War I, were both perplexed by and attracted to this
new brand of femininity. Early in The Big Money,
the last volume of the trilogy, Dos Passos makes this
clear in the voice of Charley Anderson’s friend Ollie
Taylor, who “made a speech. ‘Look at them, lovely,
intelligent, lively American women.... There was
nothing like that on the other side, was there,
Charley? Three things you can’t get anywhere else
in the world, a good cocktail, a decent breakfast, and
an American girl, God bless ’em.’ ” The modern
woman dances, drinks, and wears (comparatively)
comfortable clothes. She flirts, she woos, and,
because she knows about contraception, she has
sex. She often resists marriage but enjoys platonic
friendships with men. She craves autonomy.
Examples of modern women, while present
throughout the trilogy, are most clear in The Big
Money. Not all women engage in previously taboo
behaviors, and the texts reflect this. Like the men
in the volume, none of the women are perfect; even
their most independent behavior does not always
produce spiritual wholeness or emotional satisfac-
tion. Mary French represents the political activist,
but she has a penchant for being too dependent
on her relationships with others; Margo Dowling
is Dos Passos’s screen-struck actress who embodies
the idea of woman-as-object-for-the-male-gaze;
Gladys is the unhappy wife and mother who lashes
out at her greedy husband out of discontent; Eveline
is sexually free but trapped in an endless, miserable
cycle of cocktail parties. Charley Anderson, in his
naïveté, figures prominently in the lives of many
of these women. He represents the man who is
powerfully attracted to the modern woman but, like
other male characters such as Dick Savage, J. Ward
Moorehouse, and Joe Williams, he has trouble being
the modern man. After sampling different kinds of
women, alcohol, and the quest for the big money,
Charley Anderson ends up dead in middle age after
a life of sheer excess. He is the satiric fool, and his
interactions with the women he meets prove it.
Throughout the trilogy, sexual encounters are
abbreviated. There exists little romance in the texts,
and sex often seems disappointing to the charac-
ters. A prime example is the relationship between
Charley Anderson and Doris Humphries in The Big
Money: after pursuing Doris for months, Charley
finally has the opportunity for intimacy with her,
but the act itself is monosyllabic: After he “fumbles
for a condom,” she gets “dressed in a hurry” and
then rejects him in a letter. This is representative
of romantic relationships throughout trilogy. These
characters yearn for intimacy but cannot seem to
find it with one another.
The modern woman of the 1920s was every-
thing that her mother was not: She was unafraid of
showing her intellect, was educated, and was often
able to work outside the home. Many of the main
female characters in the trilogy illustrate this: Elea-
nor Stoddard starts her own successful stage-design
business; Janey Williams takes career risks and
becomes a stenographer; Margo Dowling creates her