This paper analyzes Stephen Crane's novella, "Maggie: A Girl of the Streets" which was
written during America's "Gilded Age"
the era from the end of the Civil War to the turn of the Century. It examines how the differences between the social classes at the time is a focal point in "Maggie" and how Crane unwaveringly focuses on the determinism of social and economic forces on the lives of individuals. The story is about Maggie, who like many women of the time was forced to work at a collar and cuff manufactory in order to maintain her parents' alcohol addiction and to help keep food on the table and her desire to escape from it all. It looks at how Crane felt the need to expose the topic of poverty and life in the
tenements that was very familiar to both the upper and lower sides of the city, but yet were seldom discussed or
written about.