One of the most prolifi c and popular sensational writers in the antebellum period is George Thompson (under the pseudonym Greenhorn), most of whose works are, nonetheless, obscured and ignored today. His harsh and ghoulish stories describe various kinds of crimes and moral deteriorations, for which he criticizes not only the lower rogues and swindlers but also the hypocritical upper class rakes and ecclesiastics. Thompson’s critical eyes to reveal social evil also inform his autobiography, entitled My Life (1854).
　  However, what is especially characteristic in his autobiography is not his fl amboyant description of the dark side of antebellum city life, but his literary technique and self-confi dence as a professional writer. Thompson theatrically exhibits himself as if he were himself a character in a novel, at the same time asserting "I" as an accomplished author; in doing so, he objectifi es and
subjectifi es his own life. Parodying the moral norms of Benjamin Franklin, and sometimes railing against his enemies, he shows himself as a self-made man.
　　His theatrical self-representation becomes much more apparent in another "autobiography": The Autobiography of Petit Bunkum, the Showman (1855). In this parody of P.T. Barnum, Thomson appropriates Barnum's life story, introducing the impresario's humbug spectacles in the first person narrative. What is more interesting is that Thompson makes himself appear
in this travesty as "a petty swindler, 'publisher' and rival showman in the insignifi cant person of George W. Hiller," alias Greenhorn. In this vein, Thompson parodies/self-parodies the life of famous fi gures, and thus, displaces the literary genre of autobiography.