Importance of Setting in The Blue Hotel by Stephen Crane In "The Blue Hotel", Stephen Crane uses various provocative techniques to ensure that the setting adds to the richness of the history. “The Blue Hotel” is set in a cold Nebraska town at the Palace Hotel in the late 1800s, but there is much more to the setting than just when and where a story takes place. In a written work, it is the author's job to vividly describe events to hold the reader's attention and create colorful mental images of places, objects, or situations. The story is beautifully enriched by Crane's use of setting to develop atmosphere, to create irony, and to have nature foreshadow or imitate human actions. From the beginning, Crane creates an atmosphere of violence, anxiety and unease. He writes, “The Palace Hotel, then, was always screaming and howling in a way that made the dazzling Nebraska winter landscape seem like just a gray swampy silence.” When Scully, the hotel owner, greets the Cowboy, the East and the Swede, the latter is seen as "trembling and wide-eyed". He is a suspicious character who behaves rather out of place. The first people the entourage meets are playing cards. He is Johnnie, Scully's son, an old farmer with a gray and sandy moustache. The farmer spits tobacco juice into a box of sawdust to show his contempt and anger towards Johnnie. Johnnie agitates the farmer to such an extent that the farmer leaves the hotel quietly explosive. At this point a new game of High Five begins. The Cowboy immediately annoys others with his incessant flapping of cards. The Swede remains silent until the game absorbs the other players. He breaks this concentration when he says, “I suppose there… in the center of the paper… a stab from the gambler.” Setting is one of the most important aspects of a story. It encompasses more than what simply meets the eye. A basic look at the setting of ?The Blue Hotel? reveals a place and possibly a time in which a story will take place. However, a deeper and more critical look shows how Crane uses a highly descriptive setting to explain the story rather than relying on the characters' thoughts and dialogue. Crane's profound use of setting allows the reader to easily follow the plot and, therefore, maximizes the experience of reading his tale. It is the small details that the reader gradually becomes aware of that make ?The Blue Hotel? a great literary work. Works Cited: Crane, Stephen. "The Blue Hotel." Norton Anthology of American Literature. Shorter fourth edition. New York: W. W. Norton, 1995. 1626-1645.