Charles Brockden Brown

Charles Brockden Brown was an American novelist, historian, and editor of the Early National period, living from 1771 to 1810. Brown was best known for Wieland and Edgar Huntly, both of which showed his interest in Gothic themes, and for Arthur Mervyn, in which a newcomer to Philadelphia struggles through a yellow-fever epidemic. Some scholars regarded him as the most important American novelist before James Fenimore Cooper, and his work also included short stories, essays, poetry, and reviews.