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| Mark Twain''s Own Autobiography
ISBN: 9780299234737
Platform/Publisher: Project MUSE / University of Wisconsin Press
Digital rights: Users: Unlimited; Printing: Chapters; Download: Chapters
Subjects: Humorists American; Authors American;
Alas, reports of Twain's death have not once again been exaggerated, but Samuel Langhorne Clemens (1835-1910) has belatedly succeeded in his ambition of ``literally speaking from the grave'' in this collection of 25 autobiographical chapters. In his excellent introduction, Twain scholar Kiskis, assistant dean at State University of New York-Empire State College, traces Clemens's 40-year attempt to leave his editors and heirs with a publishable autobiography. Out of the unorganized mass of material he wrote, this volume limits itself to work approved by the author and published in 1906-1907. As readers would expect, Clemens tells his story with an engaging mixture of bluster and lyricism, and he is most affecting when reliving pastoral childhood memories and reflecting, as a writer in his 70s, on human nature. Less successful are excerpts from a ``biography'' of Clemens written by his 13-year-old daughter Susy and used, too frequently, as a lead-in to the author's stories. Clemens intended his autobiography to be chatty and entertaining; he promised to stay on a topic only as long as it interested him. Thus the book is a lively hodgepodge of anecdotes, pronouncements and descriptions--all of them distinctly Mark Twain. (Oct.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Mark Twain was born Samuel L. Clemens in Florida, Missouri on November 30, 1835. He worked as a printer, and then became a steamboat pilot. He traveled throughout the West, writing humorous sketches for newspapers. In 1865, he wrote the short story, The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County, which was very well received. He then began a career as a humorous travel writer and lecturer, publishing The Innocents Abroad in 1869, Roughing It in 1872, and, Gilded Age in 1873, which was co-authored with Charles Dudley Warner. His best-known works are The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Mississippi Writing: Life on the Mississippi, and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. He died of a heart attack on April 21, 1910. (Bowker Author Biography) |
