Mark Twain

Mark Twain

• Publisher: Bradley Press
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781528763295
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Literary Biographies
• Index: Literature

This vintage book (first published in 1948) contains a short biography of Mark Twain, with a wonderful selection of humourous and often aphoristic quotations taken from his writings. This concise and easy-to-digest text is full of interesting and entertaining information concerning Mr. Twain, and is highly recommended for those with an interest in his life and mind. A profusely illustrated antiquarian volume, this book is not to be missed by the discerning collector. Samuel Langhorne Clemens (1835 - 1910) better known by his pseudonym, Mark Twain, was a seminal American writer and humourist. Many antiquarian books such as this are increasingly scarce and expensive, and it is with this in mind that we are republishing this book now in an affordable, modern, high-quality edition. It comes complete with a specially commissioned new biography of the author.

IN FORMER YEARS

Gracian—1938

Confucian Analects—1939

Excerpts from Plato—1940

The Consent of the Governed—1941

Boz On America—1942

Toward A Better Land I Know—1943

Shakespeare—1944

Again, Gracian—1945

Charburough—1946

Publilius Syrus—1947

I am never more tickled than when I laugh at myself. —Mark Twain (1835-1910)

Greetings!

At the holiday season for the past nine years, I have shared with my friends some few gleanings from my literary acquaintances. Almost without exception my choice has fallen on the timeless thoughts of some provocative sage who lived many centuries ago, but this year’s selections, although equally timeless, are not ancient. They are from the writings of a man on my own doorstep, right here in Hartford—one of the greatest of the great observers of human nature, who is known the world over as Mark Twain.

Hearing his name always brings back memories of a childhood trip I took on a Mississippi River packet. I remember that as we glided slowly down those historic waters, my curiosity was caught by a member of the crew who was throwing a long line with lead into the water and pulling it out, again and again, loudly calling: “full twain”—“half twain”—and finally, “mark twain”.

In the midst of so much strange and wonderful activity, the leadman’s call of “mark twain” was pleasantly familiar to my young ears, as I had just been reading “Huck Finn” and “Tom Sawyer”. With considerable small boy importance, I asked the crew if they knew that a famous writer was called Mark Twain. It was then I learned that my favorite author was really named Samuel Langhorne Clemens. I shall never forget the subsequent happy days of the trip, during which the men regaled me with adventure stories of the river and the man who made the river famous.

I wonder now if the Mississippi River, with its shifting river bed, its trickiness, and unpredictable qualities, was not a decisive factor in shaping the adaptable, shifting personality of Samuel Clemens.

Never was anyone more aware than he of the immutability of man’s persistence in playing tricks upon himself. Never was anyone more observant of man’s querulousness at super...