Мультикультуралізм як феномен сучасної літератури.

Проблема множинності культурних традицій в літературі
вийшла на перший план в середині минулого століття і дала назву новому
поняттю - «мультикультуралізму.
В 50-60-ті роки ХХ століття почала вироблятися
нова концепція, яка на даний момент більш відповідає американської
дійсності, - концепція мультикультуралізму. Її основою стало
прагнення кожного етносу до збереження своїх традицій і особливостей в
рамках єдиної національної американської культури. Основною особливістю
американської мультикультурної парадигми є те, що рідною мовою
письменників, незалежно від їх етнічного походження, залишається англійська.
На ньому вони створюють свої твори, що дозволяє відносити їх до
загальнонаціональної літературі США. У теж час вони привносять в неї
колорит власних етнокультур.

Найважливішими складовими мультикультурної літератури США
є її расовий і етнічний компоненти.
Творчість лауреата Нобелівської премії Тоні Моррісон
в сприйнятті його дослідників давно вийшло за рамки афро-американської
літератури і являє загальнонаціональну американську літературу, а не
тільки її расовий компонент. На думку багатьох дослідників, саме
творчість Тоні Моррісон сьогодні уособлює сучасну американську
літературу. У центрі більшості творів письменниці варто расова
тема, а також фемінізм, що продовжує традиції національної літератури
США, що склалися ще в творчості письменників ХІХ-ХХ ст.. Роман «Кохана» розкриває проблеми фізичної і духовної свободи, рабства та їх впливу на психологію жінки і матері,
став класикою другої половини ХХ ст.
В останньому на сьогоднішній день
своєму романі - «Милосердя» письменниця знову
звертається до расових і жіночим проблемам, проводячи паралелі між
сучасністю і XVII століттям, в якому відбувається дія роману. У
центрі роману - образ сім'ї фермера англо-данського походження Якова
Ваарка. Життя сім'ї до і після смерті «хазяїна» описана через сприйняття
героїнь - дружини Якова Ребекки, «домоправительки» індіанського
походження Ліни, рабині Флоренс і дивної дівчини з промовистою
ім'ям Сорроу. Образ будинку, споруда якого стала
заповітною мрією Якова, до втілення якої йому не судилося дожити,
викликає асоціації з країною в цілому, навіть при тому, що в час дії роману США ще не існували як держава. дане багатоголосся в романі представляється алюзією на багатоетнічність і багаторасового як одні з найбільш важливих факторів, що визначають
самобутність національної американської культури.

 

Авторы:

A. Huxley

Aldous Leonard Huxley (26 July 1894 – 22 November 1963) was an English writer and a prominent member of the Huxley family. Best known for his novels including “Brave New World”, “The Doors of Perception”, which recalls experiences when taking a psychedelic drug, and a wide-ranging output of essays. Huxley also edited the magazine Oxford Poetry, and published short stories, poetry, travel writing, film stories and scripts. He spent the later part of his life in the United States, living in Los Angeles from 1937 until his death.

Alan Milne

Alan Alexander Milne (18 January 1882 – 31 January 1956) was a British author, best known for his books about the teddy bear “Winnie-the-Pooh” and for various children's poems. Milne was a noted writer, primarily as a playwright, before the huge success of Pooh overshadowed all his previous work. He wrote plays and novels, including the murder mystery The Red House Mystery. His son was born in August 1920 and in 1924 Milne produced a collection of children's poems “When We Were Very Young. A collection of short stories for children Gallery of Children, and other stories that became part of the Winnie-the-Pooh books, were first published in 1925.

Alice Walker

Alice Malsenior Walker (born February 9, 1944) is an AfroAmerican author and activist. She is a novelist, short story writer, poet, political activist. She wrote the critically acclaimed novel The Color Purple for which she won the National Book Award. The novel follows a young troubled black woman fighting her way through not just racist white culture but patriarchal black culture as well. The book became a bestseller and was adapted into a movie as well as a 2005 Broadway musical.

Angela Carter

Angela Carter (7 May 1940 – 16 February 1992) was an English novelist and journalist, known for her feminist, magical realism, and picaresque(плутовской роман) works. In 2008, «The Times» ranked her tenth in their list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945".In 2012, “Nights at the Circus” was selected as the best ever winner of the James Tait Black Memorial Prize. As well as being a writer of fiction, Carter contributed many articles. She adapted a number of her short stories for radio and wrote two original radio dramas. She was actively involved in both film adaptations, her screenplays are published in the collected dramatic writings.

Doris Lessing

Doris May Lessing (22 October 1919 – 17 November 2013) was a British novelist, poet, playwright, librettist, biographer and short story writer. Her notable works are: The Grass is Singing Children of Violence, The Golden Notebook, The Good Terrorist. Lessing was awarded the 2007 Nobel Prize in Literature. In awarding the prize. Lessing was the eleventh woman and the oldest person ever to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature. In 2008, The Times ranked her fifth on a list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945".

E. Hemingway

Ernest Miller Hemingway (July 21, 1899 – July 2, 1961) was an American author and journalist. His economical and understated style had a strong influence on 20th-century fiction, while his life of adventure and his public image influenced later generations. Hemingway produced most of his work between the mid-1920s and the mid-1950s, and won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1954. He published seven novels, six short story collections, and two non-fiction works. Additional works, including three novels, four short story collections, and three non-fiction works, were published posthumously (посмертно). Many of his works are considered classics of American literature. His notable works are: "The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber", For Whom the Bell Tolls, The Old Man and the Sea

Eudora Welty

Eudora Alice Welty (April 13, 1909 – July 23, 2001) was an American author of short stories and novels about the American South. Her novel The Optimist's Daughter won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973. Welty was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, among numerous awards including the Order of the South. She was the first living author to have her works published by the Library of America. Her house in Jackson, Mississippi has been designated as a National Historic Landmark and is open to the public as a house museum. Works: Delta Wedding, The Shoe Bird.

F. Scott Fitzgerald

Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald (September 24, 1896 – December 21, 1940) was an American author of novels and short stories, whose works are the paradigmatic writings of the Jazz Age, a term he coined. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest American writers of the 20th century. Fitzgerald is considered a member of the "Lost Generation" of the 1920s. He finished four novels. This Side of Paradise, The Beautiful and Damned, The Great Gatsby, and Tender Is the Night. A fifth, unfinished novel, The Love of the Last Tycoon, was published posthumously. Fitzgerald also wrote many short stories that treat themes of youth and promise along with age and despair.

Graham Greene

Henry Graham Greene (2 October 1904 – 3 April 1991) was an English writer, playwright and literary critic. His works explore the dual moral and political issues of the modern world. Greene was noted for his ability to combine serious literary acclaim with widespread popularity. Catholic religious themes are at the root of much of his writing.

Several works such as The Third Man, The Quiet American, and The Human Factor also show an interest in the workings of international politics.

H.G. Wells

Herbert George “H.G.” Wells (21 September 1866 – 13 August 1946)^[3] was a prolific English writer in many genres, including the novel, history, politics, and social commentary, and even textbooks and rules for war games. He is now best remembered for his science fiction novels, and Wells is sometimes called the father of science fiction. His most notable science fiction works include The War of the Worlds, The Time Machine, The Invisible Man, and The Island of Doctor Moreau. He was also from an early date an outspokensocialist, often (but not always, as at the beginning of the First World War) sympathising withpacifist views. His later works became increasingly political and didactic, and he wrote little science fiction.

10.H.G.Wells ( 1866 –1946)Herbert George Wells - was a prolific English writer in many genres, including the novel, history, politics, and social commentary, and even textbooks and rules for war games. He is now best remembered for his science fiction novels, and Wells is sometimes called the father of science fiction. His most notable science fiction works include The War of the Worlds, The Time Machine, The Invisible Man, and The Island of Doctor Moreau.

11.Henry James (1843 –1916) was an Anglo-American writer who spent the bulk of his career in Britain. He is regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr. He is best known for a number of novels showing Americans encountering Europe and Europeans. His method of writing from the point of view of a character within a tale allows him to explore issues related to consciousness and perception, and his style in later works has been compared to impressionist painting.

James contributed significantly to literary criticism, particularly in his insistence that writers be allowed the greatest possible freedom in presenting their view of the world. His imaginative use of point of view, interior monologue and possibly unreliable narrators in his own novels and tales brought a new depth and interest to narrative fiction. An extraordinarily productive writer, in addition to his voluminous works of fiction he published articles and books of travel, biography, autobiography, and criticism, and wrote plays, some of which were performed during his lifetime, though with limited success. His theatrical work is thought to have profoundly influenced his later novels and tales.

Notable work: The American, The Turn of the Screw, The Portrait of a Lady, What Maisie Knew, The Wings of the Dove, Daisy Miller, The Ambassadors

12.James Joyce (1882 – 1941) was an Irish novelist and poet, considered to be one of the most influential writers in the modernist avant-garde of the early 20th century. Joyce is best known for Ulysses (1922), a landmark work in which the episodes of Homer's Odyssey are paralleled in an array of contrasting literary styles, perhaps most prominent among these the stream of consciousness technique he perfected. Other major works are the short-story collection Dubliners (1914), and the novels A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (1916) and Finnegans Wake (1939). His complete oeuvre includes three books of poetry, a play, occasional journalism, and his published letters.

13.John Galsworthy ( 1867 –1933) was an English novelist and playwright.He won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1932. Galsworthy became known for his portrayal of the British upper middle class and for his social satire. His most famous work is The Forsyte Saga (1906-1921). Galsworthy was a representative of the literary tradition, which has regarded the novel as an instrument of social debate. He believed that it was the duty of an artist to examine a problem, but not to provide a solution. Galsworthy also gained recognition as a dramatist with his plays, that dealt directly with the unequal division of wealth and the unfair treatment of poor people. The Silver Box (1906) stated that there is one law for the rich and another for the poor, Strife (prod. in 1909), depicted a mining strike, and Justice (prod. in 1910) encouraged the Home Secretary, Winston Churchill, in his program for prison reform. Later plays include The Skin Game (1920), adapted to screen by Alfred Hitchcock in 1931.

 

John Galsworthy OM (/ˈɡɔːlzwɜrði/; 14 August 1867 – 31 January 1933) was an English novelist and playwright. Notable works include The Forsyte Saga (1906–1921) and its sequels, A Modern Comedy and End of the Chapter. He won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1932. John Galsworthy was born at Kingston Hill in Surrey, England, the son of John and Blanche Bailey (née Bartleet) Galsworthy. His family was wealthy and well established, with a large estate in Kingston upon Thames that is now the site of three schools: Marymount International School, Rokeby Preparatory School, and Holy Cross Preparatory School. He attended Harrow and New College, Oxford, training as a barrister, and was called to the bar in 1890.

1. Joyce Carol Oates (born June 16, 1938) is an American author. Oates published her first book in 1963 and has since published over forty novels, as well as a number of plays and novellas, and many volumes of short stories, poetry, and nonfiction. She has won many awards for her writing, including the National Book Award,^[1] for her novel them (1969), two O. Henry Awards, and the National Humanities Medal. Her novels Black Water (1992), What I Lived For (1994), and Blonde (2000) were nominated for the Pulitzer Prize.

Oates has taught at Princeton University since 1978 and is currently the Roger S. Berlind '52 Professor in the Humanities with the Program in Creative Writing

 

 

2. Katherine Anne Porter

Katherine Anne Porter (May 15, 1890 – September 18, 1980) was a Pulitzer Prize-winning American journalist, essayist, short story writer, novelist, and political activist.^[1] Her 1962 novel Ship of Fools was the best-selling novel in America that year, but her short stories received much more critical acclaim. She is known for her penetrating insight; her work deals with dark themes such as betrayal, death and the origin of human evil. In 1990, Recorded Texas Historic Landmark number 2905 was placed in Brown County, Texas to honor the life and career of Porter. Katherine Anne Porter, born as Callie Boone Porter and Mary Alice (Jones) Porter. Her family tree can be traced back to American frontiersman Daniel Boone, and the writer O. Henry (whose real name was William Sydney Porter) was her father's second cousin

Katherine Mansfield Beauchamp Murry (14 October 1888 – 9 January 1923) was a prominent modernist writer of short fiction who was born and brought up in colonial New Zealand and wrote under the pen name of Katherine Mansfield. When she was 19, Mansfield left New Zealand and settled in the United Kingdom, where she became a friend of modernist writers such as D.H. Lawrenceand Virginia Woolf. In 1917 she was diagnosed with extrapulmonary tuberculosis, which led to her death at the age of 34. The following high schools in New Zealand have a house named after her: Rangitoto College, Westlake Girls' High School, Macleans College all in Auckland, Tauranga Girls' College in Tauranga, Wellington Girls' College in Wellington, Rangiora High School in North Canterbury and Southland Girls' High School in Invercargill. She has been honoured atKarori Normal School in Wellington which has a stone monument dedicated to her with a plaque commemorating her work and her time at the school. She has also been recognised at Samuel Marsden Collegiate School (previously Fitzherbert Tce School) with a painting and award in her name. There is a Park dedicated to her in Thorndon, Wellington.

A street in Menton, France, where she lived and wrote, is named after her and a Fellowship is offered annually to enable a New Zealand writer to work at her former home, the Villa Isola Bella. New Zealand's pre-eminent short story competition is also named in her honour.

She was the subject of the 1973 BBC miniseries A Picture of Katherine Mansfield starring Vanessa Redgrave. The six-part series included adaptations of Mansfield's life and of her short stories. In 2011, a biopic film titled "Bliss", was made of her early beginnings as a writer in New Zealand, played by Kate Elliott and featured on the TVNZ TV-movie series "Sunday Theatre" that aired on 28 August 201

 

Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910),^[1] better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American author and humorist. He wrote The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876) and its sequel, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn(1885),^[2] the latter often called "the Great American Novel."

Twain grew up in Hannibal, Missouri, which provided the setting for Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer. After an apprenticeship with a printer, he worked as a typesetter and contributed articles to the newspaper of his older brother Orion Clemens. He later became a riverboat pilot on the Mississippi River before heading west to join Orion in Nevada. He referred humorously to his singular lack of success at mining, turning to journalism for the Virginia City Territorial Enterprise.^[3] In 1865, his humorous story, "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County," was published, based on a story he heard at Angels Hotel in Angels Camp, California, where he had spent some time as a miner. The short story brought international attention, and was even translated into classic Greek.^[4] His wit and satire, in prose and in speech, earned praise from critics and peers, and he was a friend to presidents, artists, industrialists, and European royalty.

Though Twain earned a great deal of money from his writings and lectures, he invested in ventures that lost a great deal of money, notably the Paige Compositor, which failed because of its complexity and imprecision. In the wake of these financial setbacks, he filed for protection from his creditors via bankruptcy, and with the help of Henry Huttleston Rogers eventually overcame his financial troubles. Twain chose to pay all his pre-bankruptcy creditors in full, though he had no legal responsibility to do so.

Twain was born shortly after a visit by Halley's Comet, and he predicted that he would "go out with it," too. He died the day following the comet's subsequent return. He was lauded as the "greatest American humorist of his age,"^[5] and William Faulkner called Twain "the father of American literature."

 

Dame Muriel Spark, DBE (1 February 1918 – 13 April 2006)^[1] was an award-winning Scottish novelist. In 2008 The Timesnewspaper named Spark in its list of "the 50 greatest British writers since 1945". Spark began writing seriously after the war, under her married name, beginning with poetry and literary criticism. In 1947 she became editor of the Poetry Review. In 1953 Muriel Spark was baptised in the Church of England but in 1954 she decided to join the Roman Catholic Church, which she considered crucial in her development toward becoming a novelist.^[5] Penelope Fitzgerald, a fellow novelist and contemporary of Spark, wrote that Spark "had pointed out that it wasn't until she became a Roman Catholic... that she was able to see human existence as a whole, as a novelist needs to do."^[13] In an interview with John Tusa on BBC Radio 4, she said of her conversion and its effect on her writing: "I was just a little worried, tentative. Would it be right, would it not be right? Can I write a novel about that — would it be foolish, wouldn't it be? And somehow with my religion — whether one has anything to do with the other, I don't know — but it does seem so, that I just gained confidence…" Graham Greene and Evelyn Waugh supported her in her decision. The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1961)^[15] was more successful. Spark displayed originality of subject and tone, making extensive use of flashforwards and imagined conversations. It is clear that James Gillespie's High School was the model for the Marcia Blaine School in the novel.

After living in New York City for some years, she moved to Rome, where she met artist and sculptor Penelope Jardine in 1968. In the early 1970s they settled in Tuscany, in the village of Civitella della Chiana, of which in 2005 Spark was made an honorary citizen. She was the subject of frequent rumours of lesbian relationships ^[16] from her time in New York onwards, although Spark and her friends denied their validity. She left her entire estate to Jardine, taking measures to ensure that her son receive nothing.

 

Raymond Clevie Carver, Jr. (May 25, 1938 – August 2, 1988) was an American short story writer and poet. Carver was a major writer of the late 20th century and a major force in the revitalization of the American short story in literature during the 1980s. Carver became interested in writing in California, where he had moved with his family because his mother-in-law had a home in Paradise. Carver attended a creative writing course taught by the novelist John Gardner, who became a mentor and had a major influence on Carver's life and career. His first published story, "The Furious Seasons", appeared in 1961. More florid than his later work, the story strongly bore the influence of William Faulkner. "Furious Seasons" was later used as a title for a collection of stories published by Capra Press, and can now be found in the recent collections, No Heroics, Please and Call If You Need Me.

Carver continued his studies first at Chico State University and then at Humboldt State College in Arcata, California, where he studied with Richard Cortez Day and received his B.A. in 1963. During this period he was first published and served as editor for Toyon, the university literary magazine, in which he published several of his own pieces under pseudonyms. He attended the Iowa Writers' Workshop during the 1963-1964 academic year; homesick for California and unable to fully acclimate to the program's upper middle class milieu, he completed twelve credits out of the thirty required for a M.A. degree. Although Carver was awarded a fellowship for a second year of study from program directorPaul Engle after Maryann Carver personally interceded and compared her husband's plight to Tennessee Williams' deleterious experience in the program three decades earlier, Carver nonetheless elected to leave the program at the end of the semester. Maryann— who postponed completing her education to support her husband's educational and literary endeavors —eventually graduated from San Jose State College in 1970 and taught English at Los Altos High School until 1977.

In the mid-1960s Carver and his family lived in Sacramento, California, where he briefly worked at a bookstore before taking a position as a night custodian at Mercy Hospital. He did all of the janitorial work in the first hour and then wrote at the hospital through the rest of the night. He sat in on classes at what was then Sacramento State College, including workshops with poet Dennis Schmitz. Carver and Schmitz soon became friends, and Carver's first book of poems, Near Klamath, was later written and published under Schmitz's guidance.

 

3. Roald Dahl (/ˈroʊ.ɑːl ˈdɑːl/;^[1] Norwegian: [ˈɾuːɑl dɑl]; 13 September 1916 – 23 November 1990) was a British novelist, short story writer, poet, fighter pilot, and screenwriter.

Born in Wales to Norwegian parents, Dahl served in the Royal Air Force during World War II, in which he became a flying ace and intelligence officer, rising to the rank of Acting wing commander. He rose to prominence in the 1940s with works for both children and adults and became one of the world's best-selling authors.^[2][3] He has been referred to as "one of the greatest storytellers for children of the 20th century".^[4] Among his awards for contribution to literature, he received the World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement in 1983, and Children's Author of the Year from the British Book Awards in 1990. In 2008 The Times placed Dahl 16th on its list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945".^[5]

Dahl's short stories are known for their unexpected endings and his children's books for their unsentimental, often very dark humour. His works include James and the Giant Peach, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Matilda, The Witches, Fantastic Mr Fox, The Twits,George's Marvellous Medicine and The BFG.

 

Shirley Hardie Jackson (December 14, 1916 – August 8, 1965) was an American author. She was a popular writer in her time, and her work has received increasing attention from literary critics in recent years. She has influenced such writers as Neil Gaiman,Stephen King, Nigel Kneale, and Richard Matheson.^[1]

She is best known for the short story "The Lottery" (1948), which suggests a secret, sinister underside to bucolic small-town America. In her critical biography of Jackson, Lenemaja Friedman notes that when "The Lottery" was published in the June 26, 1948, issue ofThe New Yorker, it received a response that "no New Yorker story had ever received". Hundreds of letters poured in that were characterized by, as Jackson put it, "bewilderment, speculation, and old-fashioned abuse". Jackson's husband, the literary critic Stanley Edgar Hyman, wrote in his preface to a posthumous anthology of her work that "she consistently refused to be interviewed, to explain or promote her work in any fashion, or to take public stands and be the pundit of theSunday supplements. She believed that her books would speak for her clearly enough over the years." Hyman insisted the darker aspects of Jackson's works were not, as some critics claimed, the product of "personal, even neurotic, fantasies", but that Jackson intended, as "a sensitive and faithful anatomy of our times, fitting symbols for our distressing world of the concentration camp and the Bomb", to mirror humanity's Cold War-era fears. Jackson may even have taken pleasure in the subversive impact of her work, as evidenced by Hyman's statement that she "was always proud that the Union of South Africa banned 'The Lottery', and she felt that they at least understood the story".^[3]

She is also well known for the 1959 novel The Haunting of Hill House, which was adapted in the 1963 Robert Wise film The Haunting.

 

William Somerset Maugham CH (/ˈmɔːm/ mawm; 25 January 1874 – 16 December 1965) was a British playwright, novelist and short story writer. He was among the most popular writers of his era and reputedly the highest paid author during the 1930s.^[1]

After losing both his parents by the age of 10, Maugham was raised by a paternal uncle who was emotionally cold. Not wanting to become a lawyer like other men in his family, Maugham eventually trained and qualified as a doctor. The first run of his first novel,Liza of Lambeth (1897), sold out so rapidly that Maugham gave up medicine to write full-time.

During the First World War, he served with the Red Cross and in the ambulance corps, before being recruited in 1916 into the BritishSecret Intelligence Service, for which he worked in Switzerland and Russia before the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917. During and after the war, he traveled in India and Southeast Asia; all of these experiences were reflected in later short stories and novels.

Commercial success with high book sales, successful theatre productions and a string of film adaptations, backed by astute stock market investments, allowed Maugham to live a very comfortable life. Small and weak as a boy, Maugham had been proud even then of his stamina, and as an adult he kept churning out the books, proud that he could. Yet, despite his triumphs, he never attracted the highest respect from the critics or his peers. Maugham attributed this to his lack of "lyrical quality", his small vocabulary, and failure to make expert use of metaphor in his work. In 1934 the American journalist and radio personality Alexander Woollcott offered Maugham some language advice: "The female implies, and from that the male infers." Maugham responded: "I am not yet too old to learn."^[31]

Maugham wrote at a time when experimental modernist literature such as that of William Faulkner, Thomas Mann, James Joyce and Virginia Woolf was gaining increasing popularity and winning critical acclaim. In this context, his plain prose style was criticized as "such a tissue of clichés that one's wonder is finally aroused at the writer's ability to assemble so many and at his unfailing inability to put anything in an individual way".^[

 

Stephen Crane (November 1, 1871 – June 5, 1900) was an American author. Prolific throughout his short life, he wrote notable works in the Realist tradition as well as early examples of American Naturalism and Impressionism. He is recognized by modern critics as one of the most innovative writers of his generation.

The eighth surviving child of Methodist Protestant parents, Crane began writing at the age of four and had published several articles by the age of 16. Having little interest in university studies, he left school in 1891 to work as a reporter and writer. Crane's first novel was the 1893Bowery tale Maggie: A Girl of the Streets, generally considered by critics to be the first work of American literary Naturalism. He won international acclaim in 1895 for his Civil War novel The Red Badge of Courage, which he wrote without any battle experience.

In 1896, Crane endured a highly publicized scandal after appearing as a witness in the trial of a suspected prostitute, an acquaintance named Dora Clark. Late that year he accepted an offer to travel to Cuba as a war correspondent. As he waited in Jacksonville, Florida, for passage, he met Cora Taylor, the madam of a brothel, with whom he began a lasting relationship. En route to Cuba, Crane's ship sank off the coast of Florida, leaving him and others adrift for several days in a dinghy. Crane described the ordeal in "The Open Boat". During the final years of his life, he covered conflicts in Greece and lived in England with Cora, where he befriended writers such as Joseph Conradand H. G. Wells. Plagued by financial difficulties and ill health, Crane died of tuberculosis in a Black Forest sanatorium at the age of 28.

At the time of his death, Crane was considered an important figure in American literature. After he was nearly forgotten for two decades, critics revived interest in his life and work. Crane's writing is characterized by vivid intensity, distinctive dialects, and irony. Common themes involve fear, spiritual crises and social isolation. Although recognized primarily for The Red Badge of Courage, which has become an American classic, Crane is also known for his poetry, journalism, and short stories such as "The Open Boat", "The Blue Hotel", "The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky", and The Monster. His writing made a deep impression on 20th-century writers, most prominent among them Ernest Hemingway, and is thought to have inspired the Modernists and the Imagists.