Stephen Crane and American Realism

If it was not for Stephen Crane and his visionary work than American Realism would not have taken hold of the United States during the eighteen hundreds. During the years following the Civil War America was a melting pot of many different writing styles. Many scholars argue that at this time there was still no definite American author or technique. Up to this point authors in the Americas simply copied techniques that were popular in regions of Europe. Stephen Crane came onto the scene with a very different approach to many of his contemporaries. He was a realist, and being such he described actions in a true, unadorned way that portrayed situations in the manner that they actually occurred (Kaplan). He had numerous admired pieces but his most famous work was the Red Badge of Courage (Bentley 103). In this novel he illustrates the accounts of a Union soldier named Henry Fleming. At first the writing was considered too graphic and many people did not buy the book. Eventually the American people changed their opinions and began to gravitate towards Crane’s work. The readers were fascinated by the realistic environment he creates even though he himself had never fought in a war (Bentley 103). By spreading the influence of realistic writing Crane has come to be known as the first American Realist.

Stephen Crane was born on November 1, 1871, in Newark, New Jersey. He was the son of a Methodist minister, named Reverend Townley Crane. As a boy Crane was often ill and this sense of helplessness is believed to have led to his realistic, cold, hard style of writing he became famous four. As far as his education went, Crane went through a lengthy course of schooling over the years. During his academic career he attended Pennington Seminar...

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...r the formation of American Realism.

Works Cited

Bentley, Chris. “Introduction to The Double Life of Stephen Crane”. Bloom, Harold ED. New York: Bloom’s Literary Criticism, 2007. Print. 103.

Berryman, John. “Crane’s Art”. Bloom, Harold ED. New York: Bloom’s Literary Criticism, 2007. Print.7.

Crane, Stephen. “The Red Badge of Courage.” D.Appelton and Company, 1895. Print.

Kaplan, Amy. “The Spectacle of War in Crane’s Revision of History”. Bloom, Harold ED. New York: Bloom’s Literary Criticism. 2007. Print. 75.

Monteiro, George. “The Drunkard’s Progress”. Bloom, Harold ED. New York: Bloom’s Literary Criticism, 2007. Print. 135.

Solomon, Eric “Love and Death in the Slums”. Bloom, Harold ED. New York: Bloom’s Literary Criticism, 2007., Print. 29.

Weiss, Daniel. “The Blue Hotel”. Bloom, Harold ED. New York: Bloom’s Literary Criticism, 2007. Print. 47.