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Frank Norris




Frank Norris was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1870 , and moved to San Francisco at the age of fourteen. He later became a member of San Francisco's artistic Bohemian Club , which included such literary notables as Jack London and Ambrose Bierce . He studied painting in Paris for two years, where he was exposed to the naturalist novels of Emile Zola . He attended the University Of California, Berkeley between 1890 and 1894 and then spent a (reputedly dissolute) year at Harvard University . While attending U of C was a member of the fraternity Phi Gamma Delta. He worked as a news correspondent in South Africa in 189596 , and then an editorial assistant on the ''San Francisco Wave'' (1896– 97 ). He worked for '' McClure's Magazine '' as a war correspondent in Cuba during the Spanish-American War in 1898 . He joined the New York City publishing firm of Doubleday & Page in 1899 .

In 1900 Frank Norris married Jeanette Black. They had a child in 1901. Norris died in 1902 of Peritonitis from a ruptured Appendix , leaving his young wife and baby and leaving ''The Epic of Wheat'' trilogy unfinished. He was only 32. He is buried in Mountain View Cemetery in Oakland, California .

Norris' ''McTeague'' was made into a 1924 film called '' Greed '' by director Erich Von Stroheim , which is today considered a classic of Silent Cinema . {Link without Title}


BIBLIOGRAPHY

  • ''Moran of the Lady Letty'' (1898)

  • ''A Man's Woman'' ( 1900 )

  • ''The Responsibilities of the Novelist'' ( 1903 ) — a collection of essay on the role of the writer


The ''San Francisco'' trilogy:
  • ''McTeague'' (1899) — a naturalist work about the life and trials of a dentist in turn-of-the-century San Francisco, California . Filmed as '' Greed '' by Erich Von Stroheim in 1924 .

  • ''Blix'' (1900)

  • ''Vandover and the Brute'' (posthumously published 1914 ) — a study of degeneration.


''The Epic of Wheat'' trilogy:
  • ''The Octopus: A California Story'' (1901) — describes the raising of Wheat in California and the conflict between the wheat growers and a railway company; Norris was inspired by the events surrounding the Southern Pacific Railroad Mussel Slough Tragedy .

  • ''The Pit'' (1903) — the second novel in the trilogy, about wheat speculation on the Chicago Board Of Trade .

  • The third novel, ''Wolf,'' was never written but was to have shown the American-grown wheat relieving a famine-stricken village in Europe.



REFERENCES

Hochman, Barbara. ''The Art of Frank Norris, Storyteller'' University of Missouri Press (1988) ISBN 0826206638

McElrath, Joseph R., Jr. and Crisler, Jesse S. ''Frank Norris: A Life'', University of Illinois Press (2006) ISBN 0252030168 (the definitive biography of Norris)


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