Other New York City Stories & Authors

Washington Square Park, Triumphal Arch

Despite the facts that "Bartleby the Scrivener" was set in Manhattan and that Melville has a close connection to New York City himself, he is not generally regarded as a New York City author. The Realists (post-1865) who came after the days of Hawthorne, Melville, and Poe, were more apt to use New York City as a setting for their novels and short stories -- telling of the lives of the upper crust of society as well as the immigrant poor. So, who are the New York City realists who followed Melville?

Edith Wharton is probably the most prolific and well-regarded of them. Several of her novels are set in New York City -- Custom of the Country, The Age of Innocence, and Old New York; Stephen Crane's Maggie of the Streets, Henry James' Washington Square, and John Dos Passos's Manhattan Transfer are others. Although Willa Cather is best known for her prairie novels and short stories, she set several of her stories (e.g., "Paul's Case" and "Neighbour Rosicky") at least partially in New York City, usually in order to contrast big town lifestyles with small town attitudes.

This semester we will next be getting into the realm of realism by reading Edith Wharton, Stephen Crane, and Willa Cather, although not their New York stories.