Stephen Crane

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For the U.S. Continental Congress delegate, see Stephen Crane (delegate).

Stephen Crane

Stephen Crane (November 1, 1871 – June 5, 1900) was born in Newark, New Jersey, on November 1, 1871, the 14th child of a Methodist minister. He started to write stories at the age of eight and at 16 he was writing articles for the New York Tribune. Crane studied at Lafayette College and Syracuse University. After his mother's death in 1890 - his father had died earlier - Crane moved to New York, where he lived a bohemian life, and worked as a free-lance writer and journalist. While supporting himself by his writing, he lived among the poor in the Bowery slums to research his first novel, (1893), which was a milestone in the development of literary naturalism. Crane had to print the book at his own expense, borrowing the money from his brother. Crane released the book under the pseudonym "Johnston Smith." It was not a commercial success, though it was praised by several critics of the time. It was in this novel that readers were first introduced to Crane's writing style. He used a method that has come to be known as "naturalism," in which characters face very realistic and often bleak circumstances. This style of writing would be a defining trait of his later work, especially The Red Badge of Courage.

This was followed by The Red Badge of Courage (1895), a powerful tale of the American Civil War. The book won international acclaim for its realism and psychological depth in telling the story of a young soldier facing the horrors and triumphs of war for the first time. Crane never experienced battle personally, but conducted interviews with a number of veterans, some of whom may have suffered from what is now called post-traumatic stress disorder. Because his depiction of the psychological as well as military aspect of war was so accurate, he was hired by a number of newspapers as a correspondent during the Greco-Turkish War (e.g. "Death and the Child" (1898)) and the Spanish-American War.

In 1896 a boat in which he accompanied a Cuban exile expedition to Cuba was wrecked, leaving Crane adrift for fourteen days. A result of the incident was Crane's development of tuberculosis, which would eventually become fatal. He recounted these experiences in The Open Boat and Other Tales (1898). The background for this story, the wreck of the Cuban-exile Commodore expedition, can be found in his newspaper account (see [link].) The Commodore was attempting to land arms and men to supply the Cuban Mambi forces in the Cuban War of Independence (1895-1898) [link] which would conclude with the Spanish-American War (1898).

"The Open Boat" is the best known number of Crane’s stories dealing with Cuba and its wars [link]; however, a good number of Crane's other accounts are set in Cuba or about Cuba. These include: “Flanagan and His Short Filibustering Adventure” (1897), “The Price of the Harness” (1898), “The Clan of No-Name” (1899), “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” (1899), “The Lone Charge of William B. Perkins” (1899), ”The Revenge of the Adolphus” (1899), “The Sergeant’s Private Mad House” (1899), “Virtue in War” (1899), ”The Second Generation” (1899), and the “Majestic Lie” (1900).

In 1897, Crane settled in England, where he befriended writers Joseph Conrad and Henry James. Shortly before his death, he released Whilomville Stories (1900), the most commercially successful of the twelve books he wrote.

Crane married Cora Taylor, the proprietor of the Hotel de Dream. They traveled the world together, eventually settling in London, England.

Crane died of tuberculosis (consumption) at age 28, in Badenweiler, Germany. He is buried in Evergreen Cemetery in what is now Hillside, New Jersey.

External links

[The Stephen Crane Society] includes links to texts on the web, texts of some works not available elsewhere, bibliographies, and queries and replies about Crane.
[Literary Encyclopedia]
The short story [A Dark Brown Dog] can be read online at [American Literature]
[Includes full biography, summaries of important works, and useful quotes]
[The Black Rider and Other Lines] at Poets' Corner
[War is Kind and Other Lines] at Poets' Corner
[Stephen Crane's Nasty Little Trick in "The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky"]
[Free audiobook of "War Is Kind"] from [LibriVox]
[Stephen Crane's Gravesite]
[Free online literature of Stephen Crane]

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