Résumé
Résumé de La Piste du faucon
À qui s’adresse-t-il ?
Readers who love coming-of-age tales, early aviation, road adventures and gentle satire of small towns will find a warm companion here, along with anyone curious about America just before the First World War.
De quoi parle ce livre ?
Sinclair Lewis published The Trail of the Hawk in 1915, before the novels that made his name. It follows Carl Ericson, the son of a Norwegian carpenter in the small Minnesota town of Joralemon, from a muddy back yard in 1893 to the years of the First World War. The book calls him an average young American, and that is the point. He is not a prince or a genius. He is a boy who wants to see what lies past the next hill.
Along the way Carl works as a lineman, a packer, a chauffeur, a hobo, a stage actor, a saloon porter and a mine hand. He learns to fly in the first years of aviation and becomes a champion whom everyone calls Hawk. Lewis writes with humor and with a sharp eye for small-town snobbery, college politics, and the loneliness of crowds. He also fills the pages with real places and real events, from the Panama Canal to the great air meets of 1910.
You get a fast, funny tour of America in the early twentieth century, and one question that runs through every chapter: what is a good life for someone who cannot sit still? You also meet the people who shape Carl, from a lonely freethinking farmer to a brave college teacher and two very different women. Let us start with the boy in the woodshed.
Dans ce résumé
- 1A backyard general runs awayFree
- 2Restless at sixteen, Carl wants more
- 3A college teacher sparks a revolt
- 4Carl chooses conscience and leaves Plato
- 5Years on the road teach him nerve
- 6Flying makes Hawk Ericson a hero
- 7New York offers him two very different women
- 8Freedom and belonging pull against each other
- 9How Lewis tells the tale
Point clé 1 sur 9
A backyard general runs away
The story opens in October 1893. Carl Ericson is eight, and he is being punished with a woodpile for chasing the family rooster. He hates the work, so he turns nails into an army led by General Door-Hinge and listens to far-off gunshots from hunters across the lake. His father Oscar is a hot-tempered carpenter, and his mother is a worried, plucky Norwegian raised on a farm.
The narrator tells us that Carl is the true typical American of his time. His father crossed the sea in steerage, changed the spelling of his name, and still says Aye ban going. Yet he speaks of his own American tariff as if his family had lived here for centuries. Lewis treats this quick climb into American life as the ground under everything Carl will do.
Then a new family moves into the House with Mysterious Shutters, and Carl meets Gertie Cowles. She is ten, well dressed and sure of herself, with a mother who owns part of the flour mill. They trade boasts about the Chicago World's Fair, and Carl shows off by running through carpets hung out to air. He proposes that they run away to San Francisco and find her cousin, an army officer.
Gertie slips out and follows him along the railroad track. He shows her the Arch, a stone tunnel with a creek running through it, and teaches her to crack hazelnuts. Night falls. A bittern's cry sends both children running, a drunken farmer called the Black Dutchman chases them with a pitchfork, and Carl finds that a looming monster is only a boulder.
Carl builds a fire with a single match, then wades a creek toward a lighted window. Inside lives Bone Stillman, a lonely farmer who reads Robert Ingersoll and talks to his dog. He feeds the children bacon and eggs, tells Carl that no outside force can truly harm him, and drives them home to a frantic town. Years later, Carl will see that night as the first push toward the great world.
That’s 1 of 9 key points.
The rest of the summary, written and spoken, and the whole book: free to start.
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Questions about La Piste du faucon
What is The Trail of the Hawk about?
It follows Carl Ericson, a Minnesota carpenter's son, from boyhood through college, odd jobs, and early aviation to marriage prospects in New York. The novel asks how a restless person can find a life that still leaves room for adventure.
Who is Hawk Ericson?
Hawk is the nickname given to Carl Ericson after a newspaper called him the New Hawk of the Birdmen following his first solo flight at the Bagby flying school. It stays with him through his racing career.
Is The Trail of the Hawk a true story?
No, it is a novel, though Lewis weaves in real events and people from early aviation, such as the Belmont Park meet of 1910 and fliers like Lincoln Beachey, to give Carl's story a convincing setting.
When was The Trail of the Hawk written and where is it set?
Sinclair Lewis published it in 1915. The story moves through Minnesota, Chicago, Virginia, New York, Panama, Mexico, and California, covering roughly 1893 to 1915, so you get a wide tour of the country.
Is The Trail of the Hawk easy to follow?
Yes, the story moves in short chapters with lively dialogue, comic scenes, and a clear hero. Each new job or city brings fresh characters, so the plot is easy to track and enjoy.