Biography

Bret Harte owns the novel “Gabriel Conroy”, a number of stories, the most famous of which are the late trilogy “The Foundling of the Steppe”, “Susie” and “Clarence” (the action takes place during the War of American Independence), original poems, and literary parodies that were popular in their time (based on Dickens, Charlotte Brontë, Victor Hugo, etc.) and even a play co-written with Mark Twain. However, his greatest popularity was brought by stories, and in the stories - images of ordinary people of the Wild West, especially girls and women.

Bret Harte's wide fame extended not only to the United States, but also to Europe, where Dickens and the young Kipling admired his prose. Quite early, Bret Harte's works penetrated into Russia (the first publication in the city), where one of his first translators was Chernyshevsky, who was serving a Yakut exile. Already in St. Petersburg, the collected works of Bret Harte were published in six volumes. Bret Harte's connection with Russia is not limited to this: the journey of the Russian merchant Nikolai Rezanov to America and his betrothal to Concepcion de Argelo, the daughter of the commandant of the Spanish fortress, familiar to the current reader and viewer from the poem by Andrei Voznesensky and the musical by Alexei Rybnikov “Juno and Avos”, a hundred years ago previously served as the subject of Bret Harte's ballad "Concepción de Argelo."

Trilogy

The Waif of the Plains was published as a separate edition in 1891; "Susy" - in 1893; "Clarence" - in 1895. These three stories form a trilogy, in the center of which is the life story of the main character of all three books, Clarence Brant. Of historical interest is the social situation in California recreated by Hart from personal recollections in the activities of supporters of the South. “Clarence” can be seen as a protest against the oblivion in the United States of the progressive, liberating traditions of the Civil War. Shortly after the release of the final part of the trilogy, Bret Harte, in a letter to a friend, said that he wrote this book as “an American for Americans” in order to explain to his compatriots “what is truly great and strong in their history.”

Collected works in Russian

• Collected works with a biographical sketch and a portrait of the author in 12 books.
• Supplement to the magazine Around the World for 1915. M Publication of the I. D. Sytin Partnership, 1915.
• Complete works in 12 volumes. L. Publication of the Red Newspaper. 1928
• Collected Works in 6 volumes. M. True. 1966

Links

• Francis Bret Harte in the Maxim Moshkov Library
• FEB: Bret Harte // Literary encyclopedia. T. 1. - 1930 (text)

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• Bret Harte Francis

See what "Bret Harte" is in other dictionaries:

Bret Harte- see Garth F. B. * * * BRET GART BRET GART, see Garth F. B. (see GART Francis Bret) ... encyclopedic Dictionary

Bret Harte

Bret Harte- Bret Harte (Bret Harte) (real name Francis Bret Harte; 1836–1902) – Amer. writer. He was a gold miner, topographer, and journalist. The prince brought world fame. “California Stories” (1857 71), “The Happiness of the Roaring Camp” (1868), “Stories about ... ... Encyclopedic Dictionary of Pseudonyms

Bret Harte- Francis (Francis Bret Hart, 1839–1902) North American writer and poet. R. in the town of Albania, New York State, where his father was a teacher of Greek. in college. B.G. was alternately: a teacher, a miner, a government courier and... ... Literary encyclopedia

BRET-HARTH- BRET HARTH, see Garth F.B... Modern encyclopedia

BRET-HARTH- see Garth F. B... Big Encyclopedic Dictionary

Bret Harte- BRET HARTH, see F. B. Hart... Biographical Dictionary

Bret Harte

Bret Harte- (1836 1902) American writer; see Garth Francis Bret... Great Soviet Encyclopedia

Bret Harte Francis- Francis Bret Harte Francis Bret Harte Date of birth: August 25, 1836 Place of birth: New York, USA Date of death: May 5, 1902 Place of death: USA Citizenship ... Wikipedia

Books

• Bret Harte. Works in 3 volumes (set), Bret Harte. Francis Bret Harte is a famous American writer who won recognition all over the world and was invariably popular in Russia. The set includes 3 volumes with novels, novellas and short stories by Bret...

More than a century has passed since the death of the famous prose writer Bret Harte. But his works, written in the 60-70s of the 19th century, are still of value to society all over the world.

Famous facts from the biography of the American writer

On August 25, 1836, Francis Bret Harte, a famous writer of realistic prose and poetry, was born in Albany, New York. He was named after his grandfather. Francis's father worked as a Greek language teacher at the institute. From an early age, Bret Harte loved to read books. He was fond of the works of such authors as Shakespeare, Dumas, Dickens, which undoubtedly influenced his work.

In 1845, when the boy was only 9 years old, his father died. The family experienced financial difficulties, which led to frequent changes of place of residence. The prose writer studied at school until the age of 13, and then got a job as a clerk in order to earn his own living and help his family.

His mother remarried, and in 1854 Bret Harte moved to live with her in San Francisco, California, where the gold rush boom began. In this city, the writer had to work as a teacher and pharmacist, courier and newspaperman. He was also a tutor in private homes, a reporter and a gold miner.

The beginning of a literary journey

Working in San Francisco for The Californian magazine allowed Bret to publish his stories for the first time in 1856. Two years later, he leaves for Uniontown in search of a better life and gets a job at the Northern Californian as a reporter. But the American prose writer did not stay long in this city. He had to return to San Francisco in 1860 because of a scandalous publication in a magazine about the murder of more than 50 Indians near the Mud River.

Upon arrival in California, the writer began working as a typesetter for the Golden Era newspaper, and was sometimes allowed to write his own notes. So under the prose writer’s articles the signature began to appear - Bret Harte.

For three years, the writer published the most significant magazine in Western America in the early 70s, The Overland Monthly, after which he earned fame. In 1871, Garth Brett left California forever. He goes on tour in East America and Canada. During the trip, he gives lectures based on the problems of the Californian state.

Eventually, at the age of forty-two, Bret Harte left the United States and moved to Europe. The writer tried himself as an American consul in Germany and Great Britain - in the cities of Krefeld and Glasgow. On May 5, 1902, at the age of 66, Garth Brett died in London.

First fame

It was the “California stories” that brought world fame to the American writer Francis Bret Harte. He devoted his entire life to realistic writings. The prose writer relied on accurate facts, which attracted wide public attention to his work.

While living in San Francisco, Bret Harte, whose books are of incredible value to this day, wrote his best works. In 1870, he published a collection entitled "The Happiness of the Roaring Camp." This book contains the following stories: "Mliss", "Exiles of Poker Flat", "Pagan Wang Li". The characters used in the short stories were not fictitious or idealized. The writer reflected all the facts from the real life of Americans during the gold rush in California.

Works that are not successful

From the time Bret Harte left California, he began to experience acute But, being in a foreign land, the writer did not have access to the necessary materials for his works. One of the best late novels of the prose writer is Gabriel Conroy, written in 1876. This collection includes such stories as "Clarence", "The Foundling of the Steppe" and "Susie". During this period, Garth released the play "Two from Sandy Bar." Together with Mark Twain, he wrote the essay "Ah Xing". These works were not successful.

Recent praise for the American writer has turned into harsh criticism. His friend Mark Twain said: "The cheerful and cheerful Bret Harte died in San Francisco!" Since 1878, the author of "California Gold Digger Stories" had been experiencing a mental and financial crisis. He continued to work in Europe, despite his deteriorating health, but was unable to achieve early success.

Famous works

Many of Hart's short stories have become textbooks. He is the author of the following books: "Three Tramps from Trinidad", "Find at Blazing Star", "Esmeralda of Rocky Canyon. Stories".

But the writer’s first fame and glory was brought by the story “The Happiness of the Roaring Mill,” which became popular not only in America, but also far beyond its borders. In his work, Bret Harte described a heartbreaking story that happened in one of the California villages among gold miners. It tells how even riotous residents of the village and drunkards took care of the baby, who was left an orphan.

For a long time, because of this story, American society called Bret Harte a writer of a foreign country, a “bad American.” But his works became popular in European countries with incredible speed; they were translated into many languages ​​of the world.

, Albany, New York, USA - May 5, 1902, Camberley (English), Surrey, England) is an American novelist and poet who became famous for his realistic descriptions of the life of gold miners in California.

Francis Brett Harte was born on August 25, 1836 in Albany, New York, where his father was a Greek teacher at a college. He received his name in honor of his great-grandfather - Francis Brett ( Francis Brett). The father eventually changed his surname from Hart on Harte, and Francis Brett Harte himself preferred the second name, which he shortened to Bret.

His father died early, the future writer had to earn his own living, and in 1854, shortly after the start of the “gold rush,” he moved to California, where he tried many professions.

Bret Harte published his first stories in 1856 in The Californian magazine, which he himself edited. Later he also published The Overland Monthly (-), the first significant magazine in the western states of America. In the 1870s, already a famous writer, Garth lived in New York, and then - partly for financial reasons, partly due to the escalating conflict with the American public caused by the rigidity and intransigence of the writer's civic position - he left for Europe: he was an American consul in the Prussian city of Krefeld, then to Glasgow. He spent the rest of his life in England.

Bret Harte owns the novel “Gabriel Conroy”, a number of stories, the most famous of which are the late trilogy “The Foundling of the Steppe”, “Susie” and “Clarence” (the action takes place during the American Civil War), original poems, popular literary parodies of their time (based on Dickens, Charlotte Brontë, Victor Hugo, etc.) and even a play co-written with Mark Twain. However, his greatest popularity was brought by stories, and in the stories - images of ordinary people of the Wild West, especially girls and women.

Hart's three stories form a trilogy, in the center of which is the life story of the main character of all three books, Clarence Brant. The Waif of the Plains was published as a separate edition in 1891; "Susy" - in 1893; "Clarence" - in 1895.

Of historical interest is the social situation in California and the activities of supporters of the South, recreated by Hart from personal recollections. “Clarence” can be seen as a protest against the oblivion in the United States of the progressive, liberating traditions of the Civil War. Shortly after the release of the final part of the trilogy, Bret Harte, in a letter to a friend, said that he wrote this book as “an American for Americans” in order to explain to his compatriots “what is truly great and strong in their history.”

Bret Harte's wide fame extended not only to the United States, but also to Europe, where Dickens and the young Kipling admired his prose. Quite early, Hart's works penetrated into Russia (first publication in 1872), where one of his first translators was Chernyshevsky, who was serving a Yakut exile. In 1873, several short stories and essays by Hart about Californian life were published in Russian in the journal Vestnik Evropy. Noting Hart's humanism, Chernyshevsky wrote: “The strength of Bret Harte is that, with all his shortcomings, he is a man with a very powerful natural mind, a man of an unusually noble soul...”. The social democratic magazine Pravda noted that “Bret Harte immediately became the favorite of the Russian public. He was read and loved by people of the most diverse camps. It was translated by both “Notes of the Fatherland” and “Russian Messenger”; collections of his stories appeared on the book market every now and then; he was published for intelligent readers, a cheap edition of his works was published for the people.” Garth has earned good reviews from such Russian literary authorities as

Garth, Francis Brett - American writer and poet. He was born in Albany, New York, where his father was a college Greek teacher. Bret Harte was alternately a teacher, a miner, a government courier, and finally a typesetter. Working in a printing house helped reveal his calling, and in 1857 he was invited by the editors of The Golden Era magazine in San Francisco. From then on, his career as a journalist, publisher and writer began. He did not give up his magazine work even when he received a position as secretary of the San Francisco Mint. His first stories, “The Condensed Novels,” were published in the magazine “The Californian,” which he edited, and from 1868, he began to independently publish the monthly “The Overland Monthly,” the first significant magazine in the western states of America. The works of Bret Harte published there finally strengthened his fame as a writer for both America and Europe. In the spring of 1871, Bret Harte stopped publishing the magazine, left the department of literature at the University of California, where he had previously worked for a year, and, at the urgent invitation of The Atlantic Monthly magazine, moved to New York; in 1878 he left for Europe, from where he never returned; At first he was appointed consul in Krefeld (Germany), and in 1880 he was transferred as consul to Glasgow (England). In 1885 he left the service and settled in London, devoting the last years of his life exclusively to literary work. Died in Camberley (England).
The beginning of Bret Harte's literary work coincided with his stay in the western states, which at that time were far behind the eastern states culturally, but were considered democratic in comparison with the civilized and aristocratic east of the United States; the optimism, activity and audacity of the young country found their own special ways and forms not only in life, but also in literature, while in the eastern United States traditions still exported from Europe continued to exist. Bret Harte was born in the east and after several years spent in California, he returned there again, but his work was forever colored with the peculiar flavor of the West. His life, full of unexpected and varied activities, which threw him from the environment of the average American intelligentsia into the uncultured and adventuristically inclined environment of gold miners and settlers, gave him a rich stock of impressions and themes. Bret Harte drew themes previously unknown to American literature from the lives of gold miners, gamblers, Asian settlers, criminals and prostitutes. Despite his clearly expressed sympathies for the world of the outcast, he never addressed the issue of class inequality or the social relationships of the oppressed and the oppressors. He carefully ennobled all the dark sides of life, and his humor and some pathos smoothed out the severity of the topic, giving it touching and romantic. Bret Harte is not only one of the first writers of the West, but also one of the founders of the “local color” school in literature and one of the earliest masters of the short story, a new genre for that time. Bret Harte completely mastered the short story form, so things like “The Luck of the Roaring Camp”, “The Outcosts of Poker Island” or “How Santa Clous came to Simpson's Bar” stand much higher than his big stories, and his novel “ Gabriel Conroy" and the drama "Two Men of Sandy Bar" are unsuccessful.

Bret Harte also wrote poems, the originality of which is that most of them were written in the local dialect, the so-called. "pike". This made his works relatable and understandable to those segments of the population for whom ordinary literature had little access. Particularly popular is the poem “Plain language of the truthful James,” known as “The heathen Chince.” In poetry, as in prose, Bret Harte touched on the same themes and described the same life in the 1850s. in California. His poems in dialect are more successful than those written in literary English. Since 1871 - since the appearance of his book of poems "East and West Poems" - poems and stories taken from folk life in the dialect were considered legitimate.

Bret Harte's later works are weaker than the first and essentially repeat previous themes and techniques. Its heyday was the 1870s and 1880s. - was a transitional step from the romantic and sentimental novel of Hawthorne and Beecher Stowe to the new naturalistic American novel.

GARTH, Francis Brett - American writer and poet. He was born in Albany, New York, where his father was a college Greek teacher. Bret Harte was alternately a teacher, a miner, a government courier, and finally a typesetter. Working in a printing house helped reveal his calling, and in 1857 he was invited by the editors of The Golden Era magazine in San Francisco. From then on, his career as a journalist, publisher and writer began. He did not give up his magazine work even when he received a position as secretary of the San Francisco Mint. His first stories, “The Condensed Novels,” were published in the magazine “The Californian,” which he edited, and in 1868, he began to independently publish the monthly “The Overland Monthly,” the first significant magazine in the western states of America. The works of Bret Harte published there finally strengthened his fame as a writer for both America and Europe. In the spring of 1871, Bret Harte stopped publishing the magazine, left the department of literature at the University of California, where he had previously worked for a year, and, at the urgent invitation of The Atlantic Monthly magazine, moved to New York; in 1878 he left for Europe, from where he never returned; At first he was appointed consul in Krefeld (Germany), and in 1880 he was transferred as consul to Glasgow (England). In 1885 he left the service and settled in London, devoting the last years of his life exclusively to literary work. Died in Camberley (England).
The beginning of Bret Harte's literary work coincided with his stay in the western states, which at that time were far behind the eastern states culturally, but were considered democratic in comparison with the civilized and aristocratic east of the United States; the optimism, activity and audacity of the young country found their own special ways and forms not only in life, but also in literature, while in the eastern United States traditions still exported from Europe continued to exist. Bret Harte was born in the east and after several years spent in California, he returned there again, but his work was forever colored with the peculiar flavor of the West. His life, full of unexpected and varied activities, which threw him from the environment of the average American intelligentsia into the uncultured and adventuristically inclined environment of gold miners and settlers, gave him a rich stock of impressions and themes. Bret Harte drew themes previously unknown to American literature from the lives of gold miners, gamblers, Asian settlers, criminals and prostitutes. Despite his clearly expressed sympathies for the world of the outcast, he never addressed the issue of class inequality or the social relationships of the oppressed and the oppressors. He carefully ennobled all the dark sides of life, and his humor and some pathos smoothed out the severity of the topic, giving it touching and romantic. Bret Harte is not only one of the first writers of the West, but also one of the founders of the “local color” school in literature and one of the earliest masters of the short story, a new genre for that time. Bret Harte completely mastered the short story form, so things like “The Luck of the Roaring Camp”, “The Outcosts of Poker Island” or “How Santa Clous came to Simpson's Bar” stand much higher than his big stories, and his novel “ Gabriel Conroy" and the drama "Two Men of Sandy Bar" are unsuccessful.
Bret Harte also wrote poems, the originality of which is that most of them were written in the local dialect, the so-called. "pike". This made his works relatable and understandable to those segments of the population for whom ordinary literature had little access. Particularly popular is the poem “Plain language of the truthful James,” known as “The heathen Chince.” In poetry, as in prose, Bret Harte touched on the same themes and described the same life in the 1850s. in California. His poems in dialect are more successful than those written in literary English. Since 1871 - since the appearance of his book of poems "East and West Poems" - poems and stories taken from folk life have been considered legitimate in the dialect.
Bret Harte's later works are weaker than the first and essentially repeat previous themes and techniques. Its heyday was the 1870s and 1880s. - was a transitional step from the romantic and sentimental novel of Hawthorne and Beecher Stowe to the new naturalistic American novel.