STEPHEN CRANE
Reading Guide: “The Open Boat”
Stephen Crane (1871-1900)
1. Read the brief biography or Crane in your text or on a website. Apply
biographical criticism. After you have read “The Open Boat,” consider what
events in his life may have informed the story.
2. Read Crane’s note to the story. What is the significance of the line: “A tale
intended to be read after the fact”?
3. Crane’s newspaper account of his experience at sea contains the following lines:
“The history of life in an open boat for thirty hours would no doubt be instructive
for the young, but none is to be told here now. For my own part I would prefer to
tell the story at once because from it would shine the splendid manhood of
Captain Edward Murphy and of William Higgins, the oiler, but let it suffice at this
time to say that when we were swamped in the surf and making the best of our
way to the shore, the Captain gave orders amid the wildness of the breakers as
clearly as if he had been on the quarterdeck of a battleship.”
4. Some critics view this story as an example of early American naturalism. Define
this term.
“The Open Boat” (1897)
Part I
1. Note the first line of the story’s exposition. As you read, note Crane’s use of
colors and the men’s ability to see the colors.
2. The companions in the boat are at the mercy of what? Note descriptions.
3. Note that in Part I, each character has a brief sketch in which we detect important
details. Locate these descriptions. As you read, note the characteristics of each
character.
4. Comment on the story’s narration. What point of view does Crane use? Note the
narrator’s line “Viewed from a balcony . . . .” How would you characterize
Crane’s narrator?
5. This story deal with the problem of perception—how to know truth. Follow this
motif throughout the story.
6. Note the dialog at the end of Part I
7. Part I ends on a tone of what?
Part II
1. Examine the description of the waves at the beginning of Part II. (Note them
again at the end of Part II.) Connect the rising and falling of the waves with the
men’s hope and anguish.
2. How would you describe the conflict of this story?
3. How does the crew view the seagull in this section? Contrast the birds to the men.
The birds, like the waves, represent what?
4. Comment on the men’s discussion about the lighthouse. A lighthouse is a symbol
of what?
5. Characterize the men at the end of part II. Are they hopeful or dejected?
Part III
1. What is the “subtle brotherhood”? Describe it.
2. The correspondent was taught to be what?
3. Note how the men construct their sail. What is in operation here?
4. Part III ends on a note of what?
Part IV
1. Immediately we learn what at the beginning of Part IV?
2. Examine the narrator’s intrusion in this section. Again, contemplate on the role of
the narrator in naturalistic fiction.
3. What is the “rage” that the men feel? Note that it is expressed as a sort of
incantation.
4. Examine the man on the shore. What does he try to do? How do the men interpret
his actions?
5. Part IV ends on a note of what?
Part V
1. Part V begins with a very important and symbolic simple sentence. Find it. What
are the implications?
2. The “brothers” are compared to “babes” at sea. Why is this reference significant?
In any sense are the “babes” baptized? How?
3. What does the correspondent see in this part? How does he react?
Part VI
1. What theme statements emerge in this section?
2. Why does the correspondent recall a poem from his youth? What significance
does it have for him now? Note his character transformation. What is he
learning?
Part VII
1. Describe the colors that the men see. What is the significance of the color here at
the end of the story?
2. What is the correspondent’s view of nature in this section. What has he learned?
3. Note that each man except one grabs a part of the boat. Who does not grab a part?
What does he do instead?
4. Who dies? Why?
5. Where is the climax of the story?
CRITICAL THINKING
1. Based on the events and symbols in the story, state a possible theme.
2. Account for the death of the oiler.
3. An important problem in modern fiction is the problem of perception. What
problem of perception does Crane present in this story?