Life In 19th Century America

Through an extremely accurate portrayal of the lower class’s circumstances, based off of the real poverty that existed in America, Crane is able to illustrate how their lack of agency comes from the fact that they were born into a world which set them up for failure—not their own personal choices or decisions. For those with little money in 19th century America, life was dismal due to the lack of jobs and thusly many were forced to live in neighborhoods in which opportunity and success were nowhere to be found. These districts made the ability for social mobility nearly impossible. Money went directly into immediate necessities—eradicating the possibility to save up and move to a more opportune location. Crane uses the characters in Maggie:

Therefore, Maggie was not able to see how Pete was not in fact above the corruption of the Bowery and fell into his trap. Furthermore, Maggie’s benightedness on social codes due to a informationally deprived environment forced her to face to the repercussions of premarital sex in the 1800’s. Maggie’s fate was out of her control because her environment failed to provide her with the knowledge she needed to succeed. Furthermore, Jimmie is another example of a victim to the situation in which he was raised. Jimmie, like thousands of other lower class Americans, was born into a world in which the only way to survive was through being tough-skinned and extremely aggressive. These desired values within the Bowery were qualities that were looked down upon by the rest of society—making it impossible for him to ever succeed outside of his neighborhood. Crane is different from other “slum” writers of the era in the sense that he does not belittle his characters through making it seem as if their poverty was caused by poor decision making on their part. In this sense, he is able to see the lower class in a new