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1 results

  • Chapter 14 - Realism and Naturalism

  • from Part II - Literary Contexts
  • Edited by John Bird
  • Book:
    Mark Twain in Context
    Published online:
    12 December 2019
    Print publication:
    02 January 2020, pp 139-148

  • Summary

    Mark Twain was a central figure in the prevailing literary movements of the second half of the nineteenth century: realism and naturalism. His friend William Dean Howells was the leading proponent of realism in American literature, and in Mark Twain he early saw a writer who would join him in his efforts to move literature beyond romanticism. Howells, Twain, and Henry James were the three most prominent figures, but other writers were also important. Although Twain did not write literary criticism that outlined his philosophy of realism, his practice was important in establishing realism as the prevailing literary movement of the time.