Novelists and humorists. Southern Romancers and realistic fiction.

Writers of fiction were numerous during the first half of the century, in the South as well as in the North. While Cooper and Poe were the only ones who attained eminence in this field, there was no lack of story-telling, and in several instances a wide local reputation was built upon the success of a single book. The influence of Cooper is strongly felt in the work of three Southern novelists: Kennedy, Bird, and Simms, of whom the last-named deserves a wider fame. John P. Kennedy (1795-1870), a native of Baltimore and a successful lawyer who represented his state in Congress and was also Secretary of the Navy under President Fillmore, is chiefly remembered as the author of “Horse-Shoe Robinson” (1835), his best work; a capital romance of the Revolution in the South. The Indian novel “Nick of the Woods” (1837) constitutes the principal claim of Dr. Robert M. Bird (1803-1854) to recognition in this group. He was, however, the author of several romances dealing with the Spanish Conquest of Mexico, and also of two or three plays, among which “The Gladiator” holds the principal place.

W.G. Simms, 1806-1870.

William Gilmore Simms is, next to Poe, the most representative and most talented among the writers of the South previous to the Civil War. At twenty-three, Simms had already published three volumes of youthful verse. His first novel “Martin Faber” (1833) reflects the influence of Charles Brockden Browne; but “Guy Rivers” (1834) was the first of a series of border romances in which the influence of Cooper is plainly seen. In 1835, Simms published “The Partisan”, one of his best stories, a vivid and entertaining narrative of the partisan warfare conducted in the South during the Revolutionary struggle. In “Mellichampe” (1836), “The Kinsmen” (1841), and “Katharine Walton” (1851), he continued the story of the characters thus introduced. His historical tales were as numerous as those of Cooper, and continued to appear down to the period of the Civil War. Although defective in technical construction and by no means comparable to Cooper's best novels, they nevertheless constitute a remarkable collection and are not unworthy the attention of the modern reader. A voluminous writer, Simms was the author of biographies, plays, and poems, in addition to the long list of romances, only the most important of which have been named.

Realistic Fiction.

One of the famous novels of its time -- and still reckoned a classic by lovers of sentimental fiction -- was that tearful work “The Wide, Wide World” (1850), written by Susan Warner (1819-1885). “The Lamplighter” (1854) by Maria S. Cummins was another example of the sentimental novel, which enjoyed widespread popularity. But while these works of fiction had a large contemporary fame, they were altogether eclipsed by the production of another New England woman Harriet B. Stowe (1812-1896). In 1850 she wrote her novel “Uncle Tom's Cabin”. The history of this book is unique in American literature. It has been translated into more than forty languages. It was dramatized immediately, and still makes its melodramatic appeal from the stage -- to a larger audience than any other single play. Although severely handled by modern critics with reference both to its portrayal of slavery as an institution and to its artistic defects, the strong pathos of the novel and its humanitarian spirit appear to insure its literary immortality. Mrs. Stowe's next novel “Dred, a Tale of the Great Dismal Swamp” (1856) was also a story about slavery. In 1858, she began in the Atlantic Monthly a realistic story of colonial life “The Minister's Wooing”. “The Pearl of Orr's Island” appeared in 1862. The novel “Agnes of Sorrento”, published the same year, was the fruit of a European trip. For many readers, Mrs. Stowe's most attractive work appears in “Oldtown Folks” (1869), a realistic study of the quaint and wholesome New England character as she had known it intimately in childhood as well as in later life.