SOURCE: "Uncle Tom and Charles Reade," in American Literature, Vol. 17, January, 1946, pp. 334-47.

In the following excerpt, Burns and Sutcliffe suggest that Reade's style of documentary realism was influenced by Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin.

I

Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852) achieved an unparalleled popularity, both in America and Europe. That we all know. What is not so well known is the extent to which the novel, and the accompanying "Key" (The Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin, 1853) influenced the thinking and writing of European novelists—among others Charles Reade.

Several scholars have noted a relationship between the work of Mrs. Stowe and that of Reade. Léone Rives, Reade's latest biographer, recognizes similarities in method:

Mrs. Beecher Stowe utilise également une méthode analogue, fondée entièrement sur l'observation. Encore à la manière de Reade, elle fait part au lecteur de son procédé, dans La case de...