Stephen Crane was a driven individual, living a life under high pressure, as if he sensed that his time was limited. Born in 1871 in Newark, New Jersey, he died at the young age of twenty-eight from tuberculosis, which he likely contracted as a shipwreck survivor after the sinking of the Commodore – an experience that would lay the foundation for his fame as a storyteller. Critics regarded Crane as the first American naturalist due to his intense studies of environments and his proximity to reportage, yet the author, with his stylistic breaks, rhythmic language, and almost cinematic dialogues, points more towards the 20th century, to Faulkner and Joyce. Here, Stephen Crane's strongest (marine) narratives are gathered – mostly for the first time in German. They invite readers to (re)discover this still too little-known pioneer of North American modernism.