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[255] of de Maupassant, and Mr. Norris's novels could not have been written but by a worshiper of Zola. It cannot be expected that the spirit of the West will find perfect expression under such a method. If America cannot find utterance in terms of England, she certainly cannot in terms of France. There are certain racial prescriptions of taste and style which cannot be safely ignored. Apart from the question of method, the substance of Mr. Norris's books is of exceptional power, and his early death deprived not only the West, but the whole country, of one who promised more even than he had accomplished. Mr. Norris's last story, The pit, dealt with Chicago as a great financial centre. The work of Mr. H. B. Fuller has had to do rather with its civic and social life; The Cliff-dwellers is the most striking of his stories, and bids fair to stand as the best analysis of the life of the “sky-scraper” and the department store, that is, the life of the ordinary prosperous dweller in a great American city. How trifling may seem the total amount of this literary exhibit beside the gigantic enterprises, the daring achievements, the
Boston, New York and Chicago. Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1903.
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