William Dean Howells was known from the 1880s to his death in 1920 as the preeminent literary realist in America. Though Howells was a part of the international realism movement, his was essentially an American literary realism whose foundation was democratic, whose frame of reference was political, and whose philosophical grounding was pragmatic. His criticism was characterized by an Emersonian earnestness and a tone of rebellion. Critics have provided an appropriate metaphor for Howells's crusade and spirit when they describe him as heading the most serious campaign of the "realism war." An insurgent who learned early to work within the establishment, he later became the establishment itself, though he was never to escape the hostility of his opponents.

Most of the very basic principles that led Howells to realism changed little from the 1880s to his death in 1920. Howells's theory was shaped by his response to the books he...