Naturalism

1
Naturalism

• NATURALISM AND ITS INFLUENCE
• ON JOHN STEINBECK
• Naturalism refers to a literary movement in
  American fiction that reached its peak popularity
  at the turn of the 20th century.
• Early naturalistic writers included Stephen Crane
  (The Red Badge of Courage) and Jack London
  (The Call of the Wild).
• At the heart of this idea is something called
  pessimistic determinism the notion that the
  causes of human tragedy lie beyond the powers of
  the individual.

2
Naturalism

• This movement was influenced by Marxist theory
  (as in Karl Marx) the idea that class struggle
  is the central component of social change. This
  was coupled with economic and other problems that
  came from American changing from an agricultural
  to a more urban culture by the end of the 1800s.
• This combination portrayed socio-economic forces
  that overwhelm individual lives.

3
Naturalism

• Naturalists focused on the lives of lower-class
  characters struggling for survival in an alien
  and often hostile society a society that was
  insensitive to their personal needs for
  fulfillment or self-expression.
• Often, these characters are in some way
  grotesque, mentally retarded, or misshapen
  victims of genetic accident. Sometimes, they are
  people obsessed by greed or a compulsive plan for
  success that ultimately destroys them.

4
Naturalism

• These characters stories are often told by an
  all-knowing narrator who knows about
  deterministic factors far beyond the knowledge of
  the characters affected by them.
• The plots of Naturalism tend to depict the
  downward spiral of impending tragedy, and there
  is normally very little suspense about the final
  outcome of events.
• No one emerges triumphant in a naturalistic
  novel, because simple survival equates to a moral
  victory.

5
Naturalism

• John Steinbeck was not a dedicated student of
  American Naturalism, yet his themes and methods
  are often closely tied to this literary tendency.
  We will look at this as we read Of Mice and Men.