'Bret Harte Essay\r'

'The United States has some of the scoop come forth belles-lettres that has ever been written. American lit is genuinely(prenominal) well refined and singular from other countries. In the write world, American lit has non even been round that long. The past 337 years that America has been a country is relatively short comp atomic number 18d to the thousands of years that books has existed. The many capacious American writers are what make American literature satisfactory to overcome its short living and be virtuoso of the greatest countries for literature in the world.\r\nFrom Washington Irving to Mark Twain, American authors are responsible for American literature’s current amazing state. wizard certain author played an in particular important role in influence a specific genre in American literature. Bret Harte is the man responsible for devising the horse opera genre of literature best-selling(predicate). His stories are captivating. Bret Harte was open to contri preciselye to the rise of American literature by shaping the occidental genre so that other authors whitethorn adapt to his new style of writing, and by writing some of the more or less memorable stories of both succession, such as â€Å"The Outcasts of fire hook compressed.\r\n” Bret Harte was born in Albany, modern York, on August 25, 1836. He was raised as one of his family’s quaternity children. Harte was in truth ill from ages six to ten, which gave him free time for reading (Franks 829). This time for reading had a great influence on Harte, big him blocks for him to build on in his writing career. He was especially affected by the writings of British author Charles daemon (Franks 829). His family was so distressing, that they were unable to afford for him to slay school (Franks 829). When his father died in 1845, Harte and his family travel to Brooklyn.\r\nWhen his mother became engaged again, he and his family go to Oakland, where his m other was married. His family was tranquillize very poor though. These times of hardship were also very influential on his writing. He was able to understand difficult struggles, thus devising the problems that his characters face in his stories to a greater extent interesting. He connected with his characters in many shipway when they would experience times of hardship. His time in Oakland is what made him such a great â€Å" westerly” writer. It made writing active the Wild West natural for him.\r\nHarte consequently moved to Union, California, unless was run step to the fore of town after publishing a newspaper story about topical anesthetic white men slaughtering Indians. Harte married Anna Griswold, and they had four children together. They lived together in San Francisco, where Harte wrote approximately of his frequent stories and became quite famous. During the height of his popularity, he sign-language(a) a contract with The Atlantic monthly for $10,000 for 12 stories a year, the most notes then offered to a U. S. writer (â€Å"Hutchinson’s”). His fame led to his stories becoming even more popular, but it would also go to his head.\r\nThe briny genre used in most of Harte’s stories is the â€Å" westbound”. According to The New Encyclopedia Britannica, the â€Å"Western” is defined as â€Å"an original genre of novels and short stories, query go fors, and television and radio shows that are practise in the American West, usually in the period from the 1850s to the end of the nineteenth century,” (598). An just Western story was about a cowboy fighting Indians or a sheriff catching a bad guy, but Harte made his special. Of those stories, one of the most popular is â€Å"The Outcasts of salamander Flat.\r\n” This story is about a group of stack who are kicked out of their town for being â€Å"bad” people. They roundabout up camp together and assay to work with each other t o extend alive. The group experiences many setbacks, including a outgrowth betraying them, a long snowstorm, and a shortfall of food. While the reader watches the story unfold, he or she starts to see that these people sincerely are not that bad, and perhaps they did not deserve this punishment. This story is very diverse from the traditional Western stories.\r\nIn â€Å"The Outcasts of poker game Flat,” Harte is able to make criminals seem wish well good guys. Usually a â€Å"Western” is about a perfect master(prenominal) character, who stops the bad guys; but in this story, the main characters are some of the mop up people in the town. His is also diverse from traditional â€Å"Westerns” in the way that it does not have any guns. When most people think of a â€Å"Western,” they think of guns, but Harte was able to change that. He wrote a story with no guns at all, and it is able to focus more on the characters and their feelings, kinda than ac tion and violence.\r\nHarte goes far beyond the popular way of writing with this story. In the interruption paragraph of â€Å"The Outcasts of Poker Flat,” Harte writes: As Mr. prank Oakhurst, gambler, stepped into the main street of Poker Flat on the morning of the twenty-third of November, 1850, he was conscious of a change in its moral atmosphere since the preceding night. dickens or three men, conversing earnestly together, ceased as he approached, and exchanged significant glances. in that respect was a Sabbath lull in the air, which, in a settlement unused to Sabbath influences, looked ominous.\r\n(â€Å"The Outcasts of Poker Flat”) As is visible in this paragraph, Harte was a very descriptive writer. He was able to paint a picture in the reader’s heed and effectively set his story’s mood. The characters that Harte used in this story were very significant. As said by Abby H. P. Werlock, his characters include â€Å"the stoic gambler, the soft -hearted prostitute, the unthinking drunk, and the vigilante military commission driven by personal interests and blind by the passion of a flake” (Werlcok). All of these characters that Harte used are still seen in many Western stories today.\r\nIn fact, they are quite typical in modern Western stories, but Harte was the one to come up with them. Shaping the Western genre and writing some of the most memorable stories of all time, such as â€Å"The Outcasts of Poker Flat,” was how Bret Harte was able to contribute to the rise of American literature. After Harte’s era, â€Å"Westerns” became frequently more popular. He forever changed American literature to be much more Western themed. Harte will always be remembered as one of the best authors of all time, and more specifically, the man who changed the way Western stories are written.\r\n'