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See also: American novelist, was See also: born at See also: Martin's
See also: Ferry, See also: Ohio, on the 1st of See also: March 1837
.
His
See also: father, See also: William
See also: Cooper
See also: Howells, a printer-journalist, moved in 1840 to See also: Hamilton, Ohio, and here the boy's early
See also: life was spent successively as type-setter, reporter and editor in the offices of various See also: newspapers
.
In the midst of routine See also: work he contrived to familiarize himself with a wide range of authors in several See also: modern tongues, and to See also: drill himself thoroughly in the use of See also: good See also: English
.
In 1860, as assistant editor of the leading Re-publican newspaper in Ohio, he wrote—in connexion with the Presidential contest—the See also: campaign life of Lincoln; and in the same See also: year he was appointed See also: consul at Venice, where he remained till 1865
.
On his return to See also: America he joined the staff of the See also: Atlantic Monthly, and from 1872 to 1881 he was its editorin-chief
.
Since 1885 he has lived in New See also: York
.
For a See also: time heconducted for Harper's See also: Magazine the department called " The Editor's Study," and in See also: December 1900 he revived for the same periodical the department of " The Easy Chair," which had lapsed with the See also: death of See also: George William Curtis
.
Of Mr Howells's many novels, the following may be mentioned as specially noteworthy: Their See also: Wedding Journey (1872); The Lady of the Aroostook (1879); A Modern Instance (1882); The Rise of See also: Silas Lapham (1885); The See also: Minister's See also: Charge (1886); A Hazard of New Fortunes (1889); The Quality of Mercy (1892); The Landlord at See also: Lion's See also: Head (1897)
.
He also published Poems (1893 and 1886); Stops of Various Quills (1895), a See also: book of verse; books of travel; several amusing farces; and volumes of essays and See also: literary See also: criticism, among others, Literary See also: Friends and Acquaintance (1901), which contains much autobiographical See also: matter, Literature and Life (1902), and English Films (1905)
.
Howells is by general consent the foremost representative of the realistic school of indigenous American fiction
.
From the outset his aim was to portray life with entire fidelity in all its commonplaceness, and yet to charm the reader into a liking for this commonplaceness and into reverence for what it conceals
.
Though in his earliest novels his method was not consistently realistic—he is at times almost as See also: personal and as whimsical as Thackeray—yet his vivid See also: impressionism and his choice of subjects, as well as an occasional explicit protest that " dulness is dear to him," already revealed unmistakably his realistic See also: bias
.
In A Modern Instance (1882) he gained See also: complete command of his method, and began a series of studies of American life that are remarkable for their See also: loyalty to fact, their truth of See also: tone, and their power to reveal, despite their strictly See also: objective method, both the inner springs of American character and the sociological forces that are shaping American See also: civilization
.
He refuses to over-sophisticate or to over-intellectualize his characters, and he is very sparing in his use of psychological analysis
.
He insists on seeing and portraying American life as it exists in and for itself, under its own skies and with its own atmosphere; he does not scrutinize it with See also: foreign comparisons in mind, and thus try to find and to throw into See also: relief unsuspected configurations of See also: surface
.
He keeps his See also: dialogue toned down to almost the See also: pitch of everyday conversation, although he has shown in his See also: comedy sketches how easy a master he is of adroit and witty talk
.
See also J
.
M
.
See also: Robertson, Essays towards a Critical Method (See also: London, 1889) ; H
.
C
.
See also: Vedder, American Writers (See also: Boston, 1894)
.
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