Dawn, the journalist turned novelist Theodore Dreiser's brutally candid autobiography of his first nineteen years (1871-1890), was composed between 1912 and 1915, but withheld by Dreiser due to his misgivings about the potential impact of its frank revelations of adolescent sexuality, daring even by today's standards. On its eventual publication in 1931, critics recognized the book as an American classic, comparing it to Rousseau's Confessions and The Education of Henry Adams. The new Black Sparrow edition, with notes, index, and appendices, makes available Dreiser's powerful account of a difficult childhood spent struggling to rise out of impoverished and sordid surroundings.