Steven CraneSteven Crane : How his excellent setting and character description along with thephysical, emotional, and intellectual responses of people under extreme pressure and thebetrayal and guilt he shows for his characters helps the reader to better understand hisworks. Steven Crane is not one of the most liked authors in the world. He tends tobecome to engulfed in the scenery around the action that is taking place rather than theaction itself. Readers do not always follow and sometimes become lost in the sceneryinstead of the action.
Details are very important for the readers because if the reader cannot see the same thing that the writer sees then the reader might lose interest in the story. Crane does not mean for this to happen. He is only trying to help the reader betterunderstand what is going on. In the story “The Blue Hotel,” and in his poem ” Do Not Weep, Maiden, for Waris Kind,” Crane uses his excellent setting and character description along with the physical,emotional, and intellectual responses of people under extreme pressure and the betrayaland guilt he shows between the characters to help the reader better understand the story orpoem.
Crane shows these characteristics in almost everything he writes. In “The Blue Hotel,” Crane does an excellent job of describing the setting to youin every way possible. For example in the beginning of the story “The Blue Hotel,” he saysthat “the hotel was painted a light blue, a shade that is on the legs of a kind of heron,causing the bird to declare its position against any background. ” He does this type of depiction on every single thing he describes. Then in paragraph three he says “A littleIrishman wore a heavy fur cap squeezed tightly down on his head.
It caused his two redears to stick out stiffly, as if they were made of tin. ” All of that for a guy he just passedalong the street on the way to the hotel. In the end Crane even goes into an in depthdescription of the bitter cold snow outside. Why does he see that to be so important?Everybody knows that snow is cold. He strongly believes in very good details that is forsure. The setting is one of the most important elements of a literary work.
If the settingdoes not catch your attention as a reader then you are unable to get into the story. “Thelocality has symbolic importance and could have been sketched without firsthandexperience. ” This means that you would not ever have had to have been where the storytakes place to understand what it looks like because of his excellent description of thesetting. Crane also does a good job of establishing his characters through one of his majorthemes. The physical, emotional, and intellectual responses of people under extremepressure.
Crane shows this in his characters to help the reader better understand what thecharacter is going through. One example of this is when the Swede accuses Johnny ofcheating in a card game. This offends Johnny and his emotional and physical reaction is tochallenge the Swede to a fight. “Each Crane shortstory is designed upon a single ironicincident, a crucial paradox, or an irony of opposition. Crane stories consist of that momentwhen the characters confront the inescapable impasse of their situation, they are caughtand boxed in by fate, and then nothing happens.
” That is what happens with the Swedeafter he whips Johnny in the fight. The Swede feels as if he is no longer wanted at thehotel since Johnny’s father is the owner of the hotel. The Swede becomes boxed in aninescapable situation. Crane tends to show this in most all of his works. Crane must havefound himself in these situation many times himself. If not he thought that this was a goodway to captivate the readers attention.
He did believe that the readers attention was anecessity in successful literary writing. It is believed that the fight in the story “came from a fight Crane witnessed on histravel across the west. ” He tried to break the fight up that he witnessed instead ofencouraging it as everyone in the story does. Crane also shows his naturally used theme of betrayal and guilt through the Swede. He does this after the Swede leaves the hotel.
“The Swede goes into a bar and asks somegentlemen to drink with him to celebrate his victory over Johnny. ” When they refuse hebecome angry as if he is being betrayed by these men because they will not let him buythem a drink. “The Swede then threatens one of the gentlemen and the man retaliates andends up killing the Swede. ” Without this betrayed feeling the Swede would have probablylived. This ,the blue hotel, ” could have been one of Crane’s best works if it were not forthe puzzling ending, in which the Easterner offers a moral that baffles not only theCowboy , but the reader as well.
” “He (the Easterner) does this by telling the Cowboy heseen Johnny cheating but never spoke up. ” If the Easterner would have spoken up soonerthe whole story would have changed drastically. In the poem “Do Not Weep, Maiden, for War is Kind,” Crane also shows thischaracteristic of betrayal. In the poem there is a wife, daughter, and a mother who feel asif they have been betrayed by their husband, father, and son for leaving them to fight fortheir country in war. The author tries to comfort them by telling them that everything willbe all right, “for war is kind. “Crane also uses his descriptive setting to help the reader see what it looks like inwar.
For example in line eleven he says ” a field where a thousand corpses lie. ” In lineseight and nineteen he says ” these men were born to drill and die. ” You can just see themen running around everywhere. Screaming and hollering while their friends are dying allaround them. There is nothing they can do but pray they will make it out alive. Steven Crane is a very good writer and loves scenery.
Although he does becometo involved in the scenery sometimes. For that reason some readers tend to draw awayfrom his work. Steven Crane does a good job establishing his common themes as well asthe scenery in both “The Blue Hotel” and “Do Not Weep, Maiden, for War is Kind. ” Crane, Steven. ” Do Not Weep, Maiden, for War is Kind.
” Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing. Editor. Edgar V. Roberts. NewJersey: Prentice Hall, 1998.
1039. Crane, Steven. ” The Blue Hotel. ” Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing. Editor.
Edgar V. Roberts. New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1998. 110 -128. Narveson, Robert. (1969) Reprinted in Nineteenth Century Literary Criticism.
Editor. Vottelec, Thomas. Detroit: Gale Research, 1991. Seven: 109Stallman, Robert Wooster. (1952) Reprinted in Nineteenth Century LiteraryCriticism. Editor.
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