The faceless figure on the dust jacket of Sloan Wilson's The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit is apparently supposed to imply Everyman. The title of the novel and the publicity that preceded its publication seem to insist that Tom Rath, the novel's hero, is universal, at least to the minimal extent that he represents the young veterans struggling suavely to make their mark in the world of Madison Avenue. Briefly, the plot is this: Tom Rath, the assistant to the director of the Schanenhauser Founda...

As calm and serene a garb as a man can wear is the standard gray flannel suit of commerce, a habiliment supposed to betoken solidity of character tastefully touched with quiet nonchalance. Calmness and serenity, however, frantically elude Tom Rath … [the title character of "The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit"], and his inward solidity of character peeps forth, in quite pat fashion, only at the end of the narrative. Rath killed seventeen men as a paratrooper in action in World War II. In R...

Without trying to be sociological or symbolical, Mr. Wilson has got more of the late 'forties and early 'fifties into ["The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit"] than any other writer I know of; he has captured something of the unease of the time, its neurotic worry and speed and pressure. Yet Mr. Wilson is never portentous nor grimly profound; he writes fiction, not a Ph.D. thesis, and he has wit…. The story concerns a not so very young couple and in particular the husband...

Summarizes the story, "The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit." Critiques the story's plot and characterization.