Abstract
Dreiser childhood was not made of joy. He is one of the ten children of Säräh Schanab and Johann Dreiser. His father knew good prosperity by becoming a successful wool dealer. But in 1869 fire destroyed all the mill and let Johan injured. It started as a economic pain for the family and the long months without finding any job for the father. Dreiser spent his childhood moving from one town to another and didn't have the chance to be well educated. He moved to Chicago and had many low paid jobs. But then had the opportunity to study in college and become a reporter and finally a writer. There are many similarities between Sister Carrie and Dreiser life. Hurstwood's fall from prosperity to the street can be compared to his father's life.
They experienced the same professional situation that broke their life. And they both never recovered. Carrie's intent to find a job as well as her first month with respect to experiencing manufacturing jobs, were also common experience between the author and his character. The fall of Hurstwood correspond with his father whereas Dreiser himself is more likely to be like Carrie. Indeed they both experienced hard times to finally know better moments.
Carrie's story was shocking for the public because it stages as the hero of the book the rise in importance and celebrity of a «fallen» girl. Indeed, Carrie was a mistress of two men without being married. It also stages the difficult social reality of that time, a social reality that readers don't want to see. It also presents the upper class of the society as selfish and superficial people that don't pay any attention to the poor. I guess Dreiser referred to Carrie as «sister» as an ironic dimension to named her as a none. During the all book she tries to convince Drout and Hurstwood to marry her whereas she is already lost. She both asks for respecting her moral principles while at the same time she doesn't respect them at all. Indeed, she accepted the money of both that two men and manipulated them.
