A Manual of American Literature

by Unknown

Henry Blake Fuller.—Henry B. Fuller (born in Chicago, 1857) was intended for a mercantile career, but preferred literature. “The Chevalier of Pensieri-Vani” (1890), first published anonymously, was praised by Lowell and Norton. In 1892 appeared “The Chatelaine of La Trinité.” In “The Cliff-Dwellers” (1893), he turned from the romantic to a sure realism in a story of Chicago life. “With the Procession” followed in 1895, being in similar vein. These stories show skill in individualisation, intense earnestness, facility, and ability to make an old theme interesting. “His picture,” says Mr. Whibley, “is never overcharged; his draughtsmanship is always sincere.”

Stephen Crane and Frank Norris.—Stephen Crane (1870–1900), born in Newark, New Jersey, and educated at Lafayette College and Syracuse University, first entered journalism and won some distinction as a war correspondent of the New York Journal. His first story, dealing with slum life, was “Maggie, a Girl of the Streets” (1891), which, as Mr. Howells thinks, remains his best work. “The Red Badge of Courage” (1895), a thoroughly realistic study of the mind of a soldier in action at the battle of Chancellorsville, was altogether a remarkable achievement; it took the public by storm and brought the author a wide reputation, which was not sustained by his later work. He also wrote “George’s Mother” (1896), another slum story, “The Little Regiment” (1896), “Active Service” (1899), “The Monster, and Other Stories” (1899); and two collections of stories, “Wounds in the Rain” and “Whilomville Stories” (1900), tales of child life, which were published posthumously. His impressionism, though at times too little restrained, was often effective, and his highly coloured stories have found many admiring readers.

In the death of Frank Norris (1870–1902), another promising career was cut short. Norris managed to see a good deal of life. Born in Chicago, he studied art in Paris (1887–89) and literature at the University of California and Harvard. Like Crane he became a journalist. At the time of the Jameson Raid in South Africa he was the South African correspondent for a San Francisco paper and in 1898 did similar work in Cuba. He began publishing fiction as early as 1891 (“Yberville”), but it was not till 1899 that he became well known for “McTeague.” His later stories were thoroughly realistic. With “The Octopus” (1901) he began a trilogy which should form “an epic of the wheat.” In the first novel is described the growth of the wheat and the oppressive railroad monopoly encountered in its transportation. “The Pit” (1903) deals with the battles of the wheat speculators. “The Wolf,” unfinished, was to have dealt with the struggle for bread in a European famine-stricken community. “The story of the wheat was for him,” as Mr. Howells puts it, “the allegory of the industrial and financial America which is the real America.” The largeness of the scope of his undertaking and the robust courage and confidence with which he attacked it deserve our admiration. What he accomplished shows that he would have been equal to his task.

Mrs. Ruth McEnery Stuart.—Mrs. Stuart has written highly amusing stories of negro life in the South. Born in the parish of Avoyelles, Louisiana, she was married in 1879 to Alfred O. Stuart, a cotton planter. Since 1885 she has lived in New York. Her stories include “The Golden Wedding, and Other Tales” (1893), “Carlotta’s Intended” (1894), “The Story of Babette” (1894), “Moriah’s Mourning” (1898), “Sonny” (1896), “Holly and Pizen” (1899), “The Woman’s Exchange” (1899), and “River’s Children” (1905). Writing in a natural and witty style, she has brought out with great skill the humour and pathos of the old plantation. She is a favourite contributor to the magazines.

Paul Leicester Ford.—Paul Leicester Ford (1865–1902), whose most serious and permanently valuable work was done in the field of American history, was the author of some notable works of fiction. “The Honourable Peter Sterling and What People Thought of Him” (1894) introduces an ideally noble statesman whose integrity triumphs over the sordid corruption of politics. Some points in the book are said to have been suggested by the career of President Cleveland. “Janice Meredith” (1899) is a sentimental romance of the Revolutionary War, in which a fascinating love-story is projected on an accurate historical background. Of less importance, but still most readable, are “The Great K. & A. Train Robbery” (1897) and “The Story of an Untold Love” (1897).

Edward Noyes Westcott.—Edward N. Westcott (1847–98), a banker of Syracuse, New York, was the author of a single book, which he was unable to get published in his lifetime, but which gave him posthumous fame. The hero of “David Harum” (1898) is a shrewd Central New York Yankee, a son of the soil who with characteristic energy rose to be a banker and successful man of affairs, and who retained all his amusing traits, including a weakness for trading horses—“an optimist who has wrung from the harsh conditions of life all that it can yield.” The other characters are rather wooden, but the delineation of David Harum is strong, vital, and hence lasting. The plot is weak, but the story is true to the phases of life it depicts.

The Younger Generation.—Space forbids more than a mention of some of the other living writers. Owen Wister (born in Philadelphia, 1860) has become well known through “The Dragon of Wantley: His Tail” (1892) and “The Virginian” (1902), in which latter we have an exciting story of a Wyoming cowboy. The much-travelled Richard Harding Davis (also a Philadelphian, born in 1864) has written racy and characteristically humorous stories of New York club and street life in “Gallegher, and Other Stories” (1891), “Van Bibber, and Others” (1892), and “Episodes in Van Bibber’s Life” (1899). Of his other stories the best known are “The Princess Aline” (1895), “Soldiers of Fortune” (1897), in which a South American revolution figures prominently, “In the Fog” (1901), a clever London tale, “Ranson’s Folly” (1902), and “The Bar Sinister” (1904). Robert W. Chambers (born in Brooklyn, 1865) is well known both as an artist and a romancer, a weaver of strange and exciting plots. Among his best books are “The Red Republic” (1894), “A King and a Few Dukes” (1894), “The Haunts of Men” (1898), stories of American or Canadian life, “The Cambric Mask” (1899), “A Gay Conspiracy” (1900), which shows the influence of Anthony Hope’s “Prisoner of Zenda,” “Cardigan” (1901), and “Iole” (1905). Newton Booth Tarkington (born in 1869 in Indianapolis, a graduate of Princeton) won fame in 1899 with “The Gentleman from Indiana” and has followed this with “Monsieur Beaucaire” (1900), a romance laid in Bath in the eighteenth century, “The Two Vanrevels” (1902), “Cherry” (1903), “In the Arena” (1905), “The Conquest of Canaan” (1905), and “The Beautiful Lady” (1905). His later work shows a gain in power. Winston Churchill (born in 1871), a graduate of the Naval Academy at Annapolis, and now a resident of New Hampshire, published “The Celebrity” in 1898. “Richard Carvel” (1899) made him famous; it is a Revolutionary story of Maryland and London. He has since written “The Crisis” (1901), a substantial story of the Civil War, “Mr. Keegan’s Elopement” (1903), “The Crossing” (1904), and “Coniston” (1906), a New England story of love and politics. The mountaineer life of Kentucky furnishes John Fox, Jr., with the materials for his well told stories, “A Cumberland Vendetta, and Other Stories” (1896), “The Kentuckians” (1897), “The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come” (1903), and “A Knight of the Cumberland” (1906).

Mrs. Gertrude Franklin Atherton (born in San Francisco, 1857) has made a wide reputation with her stories of early California life; some critics declare, however, that they do not accurately represent the California of old days. The first of them was “The Doomswoman” (1892). Other novels are “A Whirl Asunder” (1895), “Patience Sparhawk and Her Times” (1897), “The Californians” (1898), “American Wives and English Husbands” (1898), and “The Conqueror” (1902), which is based on the life of Alexander Hamilton. Mrs. Kate Douglas Wiggin (born in Philadelphia in 1857 and married to Samuel B. Wiggin in 1880) has written charming juvenile stories, “The Birds’ Christmas Carol” (1888), “The Story of Patsy” (1889), and “Timothy’s Quest” (1890), besides some stories of travel, such as “A Cathedral Courtship” (1893) and “Penelope’s Progress” (1898). Her husband died in 1889, and in 1895 she was married to George C. Riggs.

Irving Bacheller (born in 1859), a New York journalist, attracted attention by his stories, “The Master of Silence” (1890) and “The Still House of O’Darrow” (1894). His “Eben Holden” (1900), a novel of northern New York, was very successful. He has since written “Darrel of the Blessed Isles” (1903) and “Vergilius” (1904). Robert Herrick (born in 1868), a Harvard graduate and now a Chicago University professor, has written searching studies of American society in “The Gospel of Freedom” (1898), “The Web of Life” (1900), “The Real World” (1901), and “The Common Lot” (1904). He is something of a pessimist, but not unwholesome.