Ragged Dick

Gorman Beauchamp

In reference to the idea of the American Dream and social/economic mobility, Gorman says, “Whether or not this myth is as uniquely American as sometimes claimed, it is nevertheless quintessentially American”. This notion is certainly portrayed in Ragged Dick with the most obvious case being that Ragged Dick is a story of individual social mobility which is set in America. This is also suggested with Dick’s personality and character. He is set-up to be filled with rugged American ideals of personality traits and character image. He is an honest, generous and industrious. He is also good looking and somewhat aristocratic. This suggests an idea strong American ideology of what a person should be like no matter of their working background of economic/social status. This ideology is set throughout the book too with generosity from others being shown such as when Frank gives Dick a new suit to replace his rags. Also the setting is uniquely American for the time as New York is a place that features varying levels of social status although they are somewhat more fluid than in other cultures. Dick is working his way through a place that Alger notes the buildings as being ‘palaces for kings and queens’. The fact that in this story a blue collar worker can rise to a higher social status in New York gives a strong sense of this being unique to America.

Cara Erdheim

Cara Erdheim’s article on ‘Why speak of American stories as dreams?’ again makes a particularly academic and interesting argument for a cyclical nature to the ideology of the American dream which is argued via culturally important American literature. We see this in Ragged Dick with the notion of being ‘pulled up by the bootstraps’ for status and social mobility. This is interesting as the idea of American Dream ‘rags to riches’ is just that. Riches. We always associate the American Dream with economic mobility however Erdheim is insinuating that this is more of a bi-product. This is certainly true in the case of Ragged Dick. The idea of ‘rebirth’ suggests something more to do with consciousness and aspiration from within, rather than the American Dream being a ‘must-do’ patriotic ideology as a general sense of American identity. Of course, this somewhat contradicts Beauchamp’s idea that the American thing is much more focused to just America and that this idea is somewhat cemented into the aspiration of Americans to succeed and be wealthy. It is this distinction of a cyclical nature that delves deeper into something more from within rather than an external cultural impression that Americans are surrounded by.

John Swansberg

“In the 19th century, the self-made man had an evil twin: the confidence man. Americans had to be on guard against those who sought to enrich themselves by preying upon the gullibility and greed of others.” Swansberg opens his analysis of Alger: The Bard of the Street Boys with a distinction which he begins to deconstruct. The distinction he makes is between hard-workers and the deceitful and sly. He says that Horatio Alger was ‘not a confidence man but a man who reinvented himself to leave behind a sordid past’. This quote backs up my previous point on Erdheim’s article that this American Dream social mobility that occurs in Ragged Dick is something less to do with American identity and more to do with individual development and consciousness. Dick is a shoe shiner in rags wanting to better himself for himself, of course, eventually becoming Richard Hunter, Esquire.