· Martin Eden is a 1909 novel by American author about a young proletarian struggling to become a writer. It was first serialized in magazine from September 1908 to September 1909 and then published in book form by in September 1909. Eden represents writers' frustration with publishers. The central theme of Eden's developing artistic sensibilities places the novel in the tradition of the , which narrates an artist's formation and development. Eden differs from London in rejecting , attacking it as " and relying on individualism. Nevertheless, in the copy of the novel which he inscribed for , London wrote, "One of my motifs, in this book, was an attack on individualism (in the person of the hero). I must have bungled it, for not a single reviewer has discovered it."
