for immigrants—particularly Jewish immigrant women. Many of her works of fiction can be labeled semi-autobiographical. In her writing, she drew from her life growing up as an immigrant in New York's Lower East Side. Her works feature elements of realism with attention to detail; she often has characters express themselves in Yiddish-English dialect. Her sentimentalism and highly idealized characters have prompted some critics to classify her works as romantic. Yezierska turned to writing around 1912. Turmoil in her personal life prompted her to write stories focused on problems faced by wives. In the beginning, she had difficulty finding a publisher for her work. But her persistence paid off in December 1915 when her story, "The Free Vacation House" was published in The Forum. She attracted more critical attention about a year later when another tale, "Where Lovers Dream" appeared in Metropolitan. Her literary endeavors received more recognition when her rags-to-riches story, "The Fat of the Land," appeared in noted editor Edward J. O'Brien's collection, Best Short Stories of 1919. Yezierska's early fiction was eventually collected by publisher Houghton Mifflin and released as a book titled Hungry Hearts in 1920. Another collection of stories, Children of Loneliness, followed two years later. These stories focus on the children of immigrants and their pursuit of the American Dream. Some literary critics argue that Yezierska's strength as an author was best found in her novels. Her first novel, Salome of the Tenements (1923), was inspired by her friend Rose Pastor Stokes. Stokes gained fame as a young immigrant woman when she married a wealthy young man of a prominent Episcopalian New York family in 1904. Her most studied work is Bread Givers (1925). It explores the life of a young Jewish-American immigrant woman struggling to live from day to day while searching to find her place in American society. Bread Givers remains her best known novel. Arrogant Beggar chronicles the adventures of narrator Adele Lindner. She exposes the hypocrisy of the charitably run Hellman Home for Working Girls after fleeing from the poverty of the Lower East Side. In 1929–1930 Yezierska received a Zona Gale fellowship at the University of Wisconsin, which gave her a financial stipend. She wrote several stories and finished a novel while serving as a fellow. She published All I Could Never Be (1932) after returning to New York City. The end of the 1920s marked a decline of interest