Essay from the year 2020 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: 1,0, University of Vienna, language: English, abstract: U.S.A.—such is the title of the monumental trilogy conceived by John Dos Passos. The three novels chronicle the conflicting history of the United States of America in the early 20th century. They document the country's rapid development into a political, cultural and technological superpower before, during and after the First World War. Their focus is on the economic and social tensions inherent in the industrial rise and democratic decline of the American nation. The separate volumes—that is, The 42nd Parallel (1930), Nineteen Nineteen (1932) and The Big Money (1936)—appeared over the course of six years and were first combined into a single book in 1938. To this day, the U.S.A. trilogy is considered not only a milestone in modern American literature, but also the main work of the well-known modernist author.