William Dean Howells's realistic fiction, The Rise of Silas Lapham, makes an unambiguous wade into the symbolic realm of literature in the first sentence of Chapter Four. The author designedly inserts an artfully metaphoric depiction of marriage after a scene in which the main characters, Mr. and Mrs. Lapham engage in an impassioned argument. Howells uses the unpleasant, yet not uncommon marital squabble as a sagacious segue into a revelation about his personal beliefs on the institution of marriage, as well as his fervor for realistic fiction. From the outset, the reader is pleasantly guided into a fairly straight-forward story of a man’s rise to riches through a passion for paint passed down by his father, but this chapter is notably different. …show more content…
In Criticism and Fiction, he writes: "I hope the time is coming when not only the artist, but the common, average man, who always 'has the standard of the arts in his power,' will have also the courage to apply it, and will reject the ideal grasshopper wherever he finds it, in science, in literature, in art, because it is not'simple, natural, and honest,' because it is not like a real grasshopper. But I will own that I think the time is yet far off, and that the people who have been brought up on the ideal grasshopper, the heroic grasshopper, the impassioned grasshopper, the self-devoted, adventureful, good old romantic card-board grasshopper, must die out before the simple, honest, and natural grasshopper can have a fair field." His portrayal of many character couples is an example of and testament to the importance of realism and the beauty of the marital relationship. Howells introduces readers to Silas Lapham’s less-than- lavish lifestyle and socially unrefined family in an engaging walk through their home, relationships and