this paper is for my intro. to fiction class. the assignment is "literature after the civil war saw the emergence of “realism” as a guiding principle in the writings of many authors. in the writings of stephen crane and james thurber, realism takes the forms of naturalism in which characters are placed in hostile environments and much of the story focuses on man against nature or the natural world. write a brief argumentative essay that explores the authors'' use of character to reveal the universal struggle of man against his environment. " these two stories are in this book( for reference): "the norton anthology of short fiction" 7th edition, written by richard bausch and r.v. cassill crane''s story '' the open boat'' on page 189 thurber''s story ''the secret life of walter mitty'' on page 720 here are links for the stories http://www.geocities.com/soho/cafe/6821/thurber.html http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/etcbin/browse-mixed-new?id=CraOpen & tag=public & images=images/modeng & data=/texts/english/modeng/parsed