Published Paper Details:

In the history of American prose fiction, William Sydney Porter, popularly known as O. Henry, occupies a significant place as his stories certainly made their appearance in consequence of the prolonged and incessant cultivation of the genre. He became one of the most read authors in the world, after Mark Twain and Edgar Allan Poe, and bears the title "Master of Short Story". Some writers have called him the twentieth century Balzac and American Maupassant because of his stories with surprising endings. The objective of the paper is to examine Cabbages and Kings (1904), a novel made up of interlinked nineteen short stories set in a fictitious Central American country called the Republic of Anchuria. Its plot details the adventures and misadventures of various Latin American dictators and patriots and American consuls and outcasts. It represents one of his most sophisticated, integrated, and insightful portraits of life and thought at the turn of the century. The stories which comprise Cabbages and Kings represent some of O. Henry's most sophisticated attempts at grappling with the complex issues surrounding United States involvement in Latin America. At times supportive of American actions and rhetoric, O. Henry also questions and even mocks the nation's ability to carry out its noble intentions. Thus, in these stories, the intentions themselves become suspect and leave undecided the question of Unites States' involvement in Latin America.