Success of Alger's Characters
The rags to riches theme which has been associated with Alger’s stories is in no way accurate, as his heroes rarely become extremely wealthy. His characters usually hold “low-level jobs in companies, often attaining personal stability but not wealth or prominent position.”
Some of Alger’s novels assert that material wealth is insignificant unless it is paired with middle-class respectability. For Alger’s characters, wealth was the product of a meritocracy, and the direct consequence of “honesty, thrift, self-reliance, industry, a cheerful whistle and an open manly face.” However, in some of Alger’s works there is also an implied belief in hereditary determinism, explicitly contrasting achievement based on merit.
Read more about this topic: Horatio Alger Myth
Famous quotes containing the words success of, success and/or characters:
“When you think of the huge uninterrupted success of a book like Don Quixote, you’re bound to realize that if humankind have not yet finished being revenged, by sheer laughter, for being let down in their greatest hope, it is because that hope was cherished so long and lay so deep!”
—Georges Bernanos (1888–1948)
“A cheerful intelligent face is the end of culture, and success enough. For it indicates the purpose of Nature and wisdom attained.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“What makes literature interesting is that it does not survive its translation. The characters in a novel are made out of the sentences. That’s what their substance is.”
—Jonathan Miller (b. 1936)