Many people hear the term naturalism and assume the literature is all about nature and the natural world. While, to a certain extent, nature plays a role in naturalist literature, it isn't the main focus. There are writers, like Edith Wharton for example, who uses settings in cities and doesn't have a thing to do with the nature and the out of doors. Naturalism is the idea that our environments and interactions with them and other people are what shape humans. Naturalistic writers approached literature with the scientific method, creating novels and stories that study the forces that rule human lives (Campbell).
There are several characteristics that are seen throughout American naturalist writing. These include details about characters, settings and themes. Characters in naturalist literature are, according to Donna Campbell, an English professor at Washington State University, "Frequently but not invariably ill-educated or lower-class characters whose lives are governed by the forces of heredity, instinct, and passion" ("Naturalism in American Literature"). This means that the characters readers encounter in a naturalist story are everyday kinds of people. They aren't princes and warriors with special powers. They are average people whose personality and actions are determined by what kind of people they are and how they feel. Campbell also points out that urban settings are popular among naturalist writers ("Naturalism in American Literature").
Themes in naturalistic writing are usually the same and bring together the whole idea of the movement. Most naturalist stories have a central conflict that is man versus nature or man versus self. This ties in with the idea that nature is an unyielding force that affects humans' lives and cannot be altered and that man has to struggle with his own heredity and desires and the actions that come from those (Campbell).
Naturalism is much more than just stories about nature. It was a movement in philosophy and literature that produced some great American writers, like Stephen Crane, Jack London, and Edith Wharton.
