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Both naturalism and realism are literary genres and interlinked. However, there are some differences between them. It should be noted that, although Realism and Naturalism are very similar in the sense of reflecting reality as it is (contrary to romantic idealism), the difference is that Realism is more descriptive, while Naturalism extends its description to the most disadvantaged classes, tries to explain in a materialistic and almost mechanistic way the root of social problems and manages to make a deep social criticism; furthermore, if bourgeois individualism is always free and optimistic in its liberal faith that it is possible to progress without counterbalance and to shape one’s destiny, naturalism is pessimistic and Atheist thanks to determinism, which affirms that it is impossible to escape from the social conditions that guide our path in life without doing anything to prevent it. ("Naturalism")

     Naturalism is similar to literary realism in its rejection of Romanticism, but distinct in its embrace of determinism, detachment, scientific objectivism, and social commentary. It is the logical continuation of realism: the latter intended to describe or portray reality in the most precise way possible, including in its immoral or vulgar aspects. Naturalism continues on this path, but adding a physiological context and showing that the environment in which the protagonist lives is one of the reasons for his behavior. Taking itself for a reflection of reality, naturalism is particularly interested in the disadvantaged social classes – peasants, workers or prostitutes.

•  Naturalism suggests a philosophical pessimism in which writers use scientific techniques to depict human beings as objective and impartial characters; whereas realism focuses on literary technique.
• Realism depicts things as they appear, while naturalism portrays a deterministic view of a character’s actions and life.
• Naturalism concludes that natural forces predetermine a character’s decisions, making him/her act in a particular way. Realism poses that a decision of a character comes from his response to a certain situation.
• Naturalism is considered to be an evolution of Realism. In fact, most of the realistic authors evolved towards this materialistic current, although others oriented their description of reality towards the interior of the character, arriving at the psychological novel.
•   Naturalism, like Realism, refutes Romanticism by rejecting evasion and turning its gaze to the closest, material and daily reality, but, far from being satisfied with the description of the bourgeois mesocracy and its individualistic and materialistic mentality, it extends its look at the most disadvantaged classes of society and tries to explain the evils they suffer in a deterministic way.
• Naturalism aimed to explain human behavior and its narrators tried to interpret life by describing the social environment to discover the laws that govern human behavior.
•  Realism shows an ideal anthropological picture of objective autonomy, on the other hand, naturalism is based on the milieu belonging to every human being and the recognizability / predictability of human behavior by means of science. ("Naturalism in Literature")

     The impact that naturalism has left on literary writers is colossal, leading to the evolution of the modern movement. Generally, naturalistic works expose dark sides of life such as prejudice, racism, poverty, prostitution, filth, and disease. Since these works are often pessimistic and blunt, they receive heavy criticism. Despite the echoing pessimism in this literary output, naturalists are generally concerned with improving the human condition around the world.

     It is not so easy to answer whether naturalism marks the beginning of literary modernism. On the one hand, it is groundbreaking for the thematic treatment of social problems in the modern city and also breaks with all the poetics according to which people are thought of as autonomous beings. On the other hand, naturalism is based on the idea of the recognizability of the world through the materialistic- positivistic sciences of its time, so it belongs to science.

     At the end, despite their claim to complete objectivity, the literary naturalists were handicapped by certain biases inherent in their deterministic theories. Though they faithfully reflected nature, it was always a nature “red in tooth and claw.” Their views on heredity gave them a predilection for simple characters dominated by strong, elemental passions. Their views on the overpowering effects of environment led them to select for subjects the most oppressive environments—the slums or the underworld—and they documented these milieus, often in dreary and sordid detail. The drab palette of Vincent van Gogh’s naturalistic painting “The Potato Eaters” (1885; Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam) was the palette of literary naturalism. Finally, they were unable to suppress an element of romantic protest against the social conditions they described. ("Naturalism")

     As a historical movement, naturalism per se was short-lived; but it contributed to art an enrichment of realism, new areas of subject matter, and a largeness and formlessness that was indeed closer to life than to art. Its multiplicity of impressions conveyed the sense of a world in constant flux, inevitably jungle-like, because it teemed with interdependent lives.