Other editions of book Maggie: A Girl of the Streets

Maggie is "regarded as the first work of unalloyed naturalism in American fiction." According to the naturalistic principles, a character is set into a world where there is no escape from one's biological heredity. Additionally, the circumstances in which a person finds oneself will dominate one's behavior, depriving the individual of responsibility. Although Stephen Crane denied any influence by émile Zola, the creator of Naturalism, on his work, examples in his texts indicate that this American author was inspired by French naturalism.

Stephen Crane's first novel is the tale of a pretty young slum girl driven to brutal excesses by poverty and loneliness. It was considered so sexually frank and realistic, that the book had to be privately printed at first. It and GEORGE'S MOTHER, the shorter novel that follows in this edition, were eventually hailed as the first genuine expressions of Naturalism in American letters and established their creator as the American apostle of an artistic revolution which was to alter the shape and destiny of civilization itself.

Maggie: A Girl of the Streets is about an attractive young woman from the Bowery who falls for a man who promises to rescue her from poverty and solitude. Crane’s now classic novella was initially rejected by publishers who considered the realistic social themes risqué for 1893. Crane – who was 22 years old at the time – financed the book's publication himself. After the great success of his The Red Badge of Courage two years later, Maggie was reissued to wide acclaim.

"Maggie, A Girl of the Streets" book has a beautiful glossy cover and a blank page for the dedication. "The babe, Tommie, died. He went away in a white, insignificant coffin, his small waxen hand clutching a flower that the girl, Maggie, had stolen from an Italian. She and Jimmie lived. The inexperienced fibres of the boy's eyes were hardened at an early age. He became a young man of leather. He lived some red years without laboring. During that time his sneer became chronic. He studied human nature in the gutter, and found it no worse than he thought he had reason to believe it. He never conceived a respect for the world, because he had begun with no idols that it had smashed."

Maggie is "regarded as the first work of unalloyed naturalism in American fiction." According to the naturalistic principles, a character is set into a world where there is no escape from one's biological heredity. Additionally, the circumstances in which a person finds oneself will dominate one's behavior, depriving the individual of responsibility. Although Stephen Crane denied any influence by Émile Zola, the creator of Naturalism, on his work, examples in his texts indicate that this American author was inspired by French naturalism.

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"Maggie: A Girl of the Streets", Stephen Crane's first novel, is the story of a beautiful young girl living in the slums of New York in the late 19th Century. "Maggie: A Girl of the Streets" is a shockingly explicit portrait of the brutal conditions that existed in the poverty-stricken slums of New York. Originally refused by all publishers that it was submitted to because of its brutal and sexual realism, "Maggie: A Girl of the Streets" was first published by Stephen Crane at his own expense.

Stephen Crane (November 1, 1871 – June 5, 1900) was an American novelist, short story writer, poet and journalist who wrote prolifically in his short life, becoming one of the best writers in the genres of Realism and Naturalism. Like Ambrose Bierce, Crane wrote often about war, inspired in part by his time spent as a war correspondent. One of his admirers was none other than Ernest Hemingway, who was influenced heavily by Crane’s style. Maggie: A Girl of the Streets was Crane's first novel, and a prime example of what scholars call the Naturalist movement. Its gritty and realistic depiction of a family with all kinds of troubles at home was considered controversial in its time, but it's now acknowledged as a classic.

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