Live a western adventure


Western fiction

Western fiction is a genre of literaturethe 1920s, western fiction greatly benefited
typically set in the American Old West(as did the author Max Brand, who excelled at
between the years of approximately 1860 andthe western short story). The simultaneous
1900.popularity of Western movies in the 1920s
also  helped  the  genre.
The Western got its start in the "penny
dreadfuls" and later the "dime novels" thatIn the 1940s several seminal westerns were
first began to be published in thepublished including The Ox-Bow Incident
mid-nineteenth century. These cheaply made(1940) by Walter van Tilburg Clark, The Big
books were published to capitalize on theSky (1947) and The Way West (1949) by A.B.
many fanciful yet supposedly true storiesGuthrie, Jr., and Shane (1949) by Jack
that were being told about the mountain men,Schaefer. Many other western authors gained
outlaws, settlers and lawmen who were tamingreadership in the 1950s, such as Luke Short,
the western frontier. By 1900, the new mediumRay  Hogan,  and  Louis  L'Amour.
of pulp magazines also helped to relate these
adventures to easterners. Meanwhile,The genre peaked around the early 1960s,
non-American authors like the German Karl Maylargely due to the tremendous number of
picked up the genre, went to full novelwesterns on television. The burnout of the
length, and made it hugely popular andAmerican public on television westerns in the
successful in continental Europe from aboutlate 1960s seemed to have an affect on the
1880 on, though they were generally dismissedliterature as well, and interest in western
as trivial by the literary critics of theliterature began to wane. In the 1970s, the
day.work of Louis L'Amour began to catch hold of
most western readers and he has tended to
The western in American literature began todominate the western reader lists ever since.
emerge with the novels of James FenimoreGeorge G. Gilman also maintained a cult
Cooper, particularly his Leatherstockingfollowing for several years in the 1970s and
Tales. But The Virginian by Owen Wister,1980s. Readership as a whole began to drop
published in 1902, is considered by many tooff in the mid- to late '70s and has reached
be the pioneering "literary" western novel,a new low today, and most bookstores, outside
containing the core element of a ruggedof a few western states, only carry a small
individual who stick to his guns in the facenumber of Western fiction books.
of trouble, neglecting chances to simply walkNevertheless, several Western fiction series
away. This seeming bundle of cliches wasare published monthly, such as The Trailsman,
fresh and hugely popular in 1902, andSlocum,  and  Longarm.
elements of this formula appear in most
Western  stories  ever  since.Western authors have an organisation that
represents them called the Western Writers of
Popularity grew with the publication of ZaneAmerica, who present the annual Golden Spur
Grey's Riders of the Purple Sage in 1912.Awards.
When pulp magazines exploded in popularity in



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