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3 / Chauncey Brewster Tinker Chauncey Brewster Tinker (1876–1953) was professor of English literature at Yale University (1899–1945), where he was affectionately known as “Yale’s Dr. Johnson.” He was among the first to recognize Lewis’s talent. Tinker, whose mind Lewis found “keen, appreciative, eager, humorous,” inspired him to excel in his studies during his first year. Source: Chauncey Brewster Tinker, “­ Sinclair Lewis, a Few Reminiscences,” Proceedings of the Ameri­ can Academy of Arts and Letters n.s. 2 (1952): 65–67. My own acquaintance with Lewis had been formed as early as Sep­ tem­ ber 1903. It began, oddly enough, as I was walking across the old campus on my way to the very first class which I ever taught at Yale College. I was accosted by a tall, red-­ headed boy, who asked, “Are you my Prof?My name is Harry Lewis.” “Oh yes,” I replied in some surprise. “I have your name on my list. How do you do?” He went on, “How about this fellow Yeats that’s going to lecture tonight?” “Well,” I answered, “he is an Irish poet, and his name is pronounced ‘Yates.’ You had better go and hear him.” It was clear that the boy was interested in poetry. So was I. Here was a bond between us. I was never dismayed by the presence in my classroom of this rather gawky and excitableperson, whom his classmates presently called “Red Lewis.”He some­ times wearied me, but he was my best student, and my eager helper. He enjoyed all the work and wanted to recite most of the time. His thirst was hydroptic. He often stayed after class to talk with me, and his classmates criticized him for it. But he did not care. He and I loved the same things, and that was enough for Harry. When he left me after one of these interviews, I was no better than a deflated balloon, but his enthusiasm won me, and we became good friends. This enthusiasm I shall always remember as his first and most conspicuous quality, and I am glad to have known him in his youth when the skies glowed with the dawn of a glad new day. He was of course at the furthest remove from a sentimentalist. Nevertheless there was, I believe, at the heart of the creature a passionate affection that irra- 20 / Sinclair Lewis Remembered diated everything around him. But association with him was no quieting experience . He wanted in return as much as he gave, and this was of course a staggering demand. To supply it with anything like continuity was, for a young instructor, simply out of the question. After all, one had one’s work to do, and it required most of one’s time. I must beware of giving the impression that there could be any intimacy between a young instructor and a freshman in that forgotten world, but affection and respect were by no means incompatible with it. There was a third passion that frequently held sway within him. I do not know how to name it, save to call it unexpectedness. With Harry you could never tell. To fit him into a category or to look for any principle that governed his behavior was to discover that nothing would serve to define him. The conventions and restrictions of good society—especially of good collegiate society—were offensive to him. His abiding temptation was to undermine them and blow them at the moon. He might in that process spread a good deal of discomfort and make the judicious grieve, but at least life ceased at once to be commonplace and dull. After all, he was Red Lewis, and friend as well as foe had to admit it. An anecdote from a later period of life will illustrate his utter waywardness. After the passage of a number of years, his classmates, in repentant mood, invited him to attend a class dinner at the Yale Club and make a few remarks. When his turn came to speak, he rose and began in some such way as this, “When I was in college, you fellows had no use for me, and I have to tell you that I have none for you.” His remarks are said to have been received with thunderous applause. Lewis had cleared the air. He had purged the stuffed bosom, and thereafter much was forgotten and all was forgiven. Similarly, when membership in the Institute was offered to...

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