A review by jessfoley
Maggie: A Girl of the Streets and George's Mother by Van Wyck Brooks, Stephen Crane

1.0

When I found a copy of Maggie: A girl of the Streets (including George's Mother: a tragic tale of the Bowery) at Molly's Books for only $3 in the Italian Market I was over the moon. It's thrilling to read that Crane " slept in Bowery shelters; sat in a tramp's clothes in Union Square , listening to the talk of hoboes, and stood all night in a blizzard watching men in a bread line" (p.1).
I appreciate the effort , yet despite his hanging about, the resulting two short novels prove that Crane never understood the Bowery of the 1890's.