SOURCE: Metzger, Charles R. “Realistic Devices in Stephen Crane's ‘The Open Boat’.” The Midwest Quarterly 4, no. 1 (October 1962): 47-54.

In the following essay, Metzger examines the realistic elements in “The Open Boat.”

There is some argument among critics over the question of whether Stephen Crane's fiction is classically realistic or classically naturalistic. Accepting the working definition of naturalism as pessimistic realism, we can, if we wish, turn from the critic's argument over whether Crane is a realistic writer or a naturalistic one to consideration of realistic elements in his writing, leaving to others the determination of whether or not the total impression of his writing or of each single work is pessimistic or neutral or something else still.

There is much to be said for discussing realistic or romantic or naturalistic “elements” in the writing of a given author rather than discussing the author as a “romantic,” or a...