The Gold Rush Writers

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This paper looks at the styles of the many Gold Rush writers that came out west in search of writing the great American story. The writers shows that while often that didn't happen, these writers each had their own descriptive analysis of the way the gold rush affected the society.

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"I was out prospecting on the Stanislaus, tramping all day long with pick and pan and horn, and washing a hat full of dirt here and there, always expecting to make a rich strike, and never doing it. It was a lovely reason, woodsy, balmy, delicious, and had once been populous, long years before, but now the people had vanished and the charming paradise was a solitude? (Twain 14). This quote from "The Californian's Tale" shows the affect of the gold rush upon the California landscape. Once the land was charming and full of people, but now it is barren. While most people think of the gold rush era of American history as a time where miners grabbed their shovels and headed west to dig in the clean air and peaceful surroundings of the California mountains, the gold rush was anything but peaceful. Mining was difficult and miners had little affinity for the land; they only cared about excavating the land for the gold. These miners brought a carefree attitude to the west, not weighing the effects of their actions upon the California landscape. However, the miners were not alone in their actions. The "gold rush writers," the most popular of whom was Mark Twain, also brought a something-for-nothing attitude to California. He was surprisingly unconcerned about the impact of so many people on so fragile a land. The most salient of which concerned romanticizing the gold rush, exploiting the resources of the California landscape, and the destruction of the land."

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