In his time, Mark Twain was known variously as the American Rabelais, the American Cervantes, and the American Dickens, but none of these definitions do him justice; he was the one and only American Mark Twain, humorist par excellence. Our Treasury is a priceless collection of vintage Twain. In these stories, satires, travel pieces, speeches, letters and anecdotes, Twain pokes fun at himself and his fellow creatures in places as diverse as the Mississippi riverboats and the castles of Europe. Here are excerpts from longer works, like Tom Sawyer whitewashing his fence, as well as a host of less well-known though equally funny pieces, like Concerning Chambermaids’, ‘Fenimore Cooper’s Literary Offences’ and the delightfully self-mocking ‘An Item Which the Editor Himself Could Not Understand’. Twain also enjoyed ethical dilemmas. In ‘The £1,000,000 Bank Note’, a penniless American in London receives an eccentric gift with a sting in the tail; in ‘The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg’, an honest town is seduced by the arrival of a mysterious sack of gold. But in the end, ‘It is an honest town once more, and the man will have to rise early that catches it napping again.’ This ending, like all the writings gathered here, sums up Mark Twain’s uniquely irresistible combination of innocent, homespun wisdom and wickedly dry wit.
Author
Librarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database. Samuel Langhorne Clemens, better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American author and humorist. He is noted for his novels Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885), called "the Great American Novel", and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876). Twain grew up in Hannibal, Missouri, which would later provide the setting for Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer. He apprenticed with a printer. He also worked as a typesetter and contributed articles to his older brother Orion's newspaper. After toiling as a printer in various cities, he became a master riverboat pilot on the Mississippi River, before heading west to join Orion. He was a failure at gold mining, so he next turned to journalism. While a reporter, he wrote a humorous story, "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County," which proved to be very popular and brought him nationwide attention. His travelogues were also well-received. Twain had found his calling. He achieved great success as a writer and public speaker. His wit and satire earned praise from critics and peers, and he was a friend to presidents, artists, industrialists, and European royalty. However, he lacked financial acumen. Though he made a great deal of money from his writings and lectures, he squandered it on various ventures, in particular the Paige Compositor, and was forced to declare bankruptcy. With the help of Henry Huttleston Rogers, however, he eventually overcame his financial troubles. Twain worked hard to ensure that all of his creditors were paid in full, even though his bankruptcy had relieved him of the legal responsibility. Born during a visit by Halley's Comet, he died on its return. He was lauded as the "greatest American humorist of his age", and William Faulkner called Twain "the father of American literature". Excerpted from Wikipedia. AKA: Μαρκ Τουαίν (Greek)
