Mark Twain | |
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Real Name |
Samuel Langhorne Clemens |
Born |
November 30, 1835 |
Died |
April 21, 1910 |
Origin[]
Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), known by the pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, and essayist. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has produced," with William Faulkner calling him "the father of American literature." Twain's novels include The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876) and its sequel, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884), with the latter often called the "Great American Novel." He also wrote A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (1889) and Pudd'nhead Wilson (1894) and cowrote The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today (1873) with Charles Dudley Warner.
Twain was raised in Hannibal, Missouri, which later provided the setting for both Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. He served an apprenticeship with a printer early in his career, and then worked as a typesetter, contributing articles to his older brother Orion Clemens' newspaper. Twain then became a riverboat pilot on the Mississippi River, which provided him the material for Life on the Mississippi (1883). Soon after, Twain headed west to join Orion in Nevada. He referred humorously to his lack of success at mining, turning to journalism for the Virginia City Territorial Enterprise.
Twain first achieved success as a writer with the humorous story "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County," which was published in 1865; it was based on a story that he heard at Angels Hotel in Angels Camp, California, where Twain had spent some time while he was working as a miner. The short story brought Twain international attention. He wrote both fiction and non-fiction. As his fame grew, Twain became a much sought-after speaker. His wit and satire, both in prose and in speech, earned praise from critics and peers, and Twain was a friend to presidents, artists, industrialists, and European royalty.
Although Twain initially spoke out in favor of American interests in the Hawaiian Islands, he later reversed his position, going on to become vice president of the American Anti-Imperialist League from 1901 until his death in 1910, coming out strongly against the Philippine-American War and American colonialism. Twain published a satirical pamphlet, "King Leopold's Soliloquy", in 1905 about Belgian atrocities in the Congo Free State.
Twain earned a great deal of money from his writing and lectures, but invested in ventures that lost most of it, such as the Paige Compositor, a mechanical typesetter that failed because of its complexity and imprecision. He filed for bankruptcy in the wake of these financial setbacks, but in time overcame his financial troubles with the help of Standard Oil executive Henry Huttleston Rogers. Twain eventually paid all his creditors in full, even though his declaration of bankruptcy meant he was not required to do so. Twain was born shortly after an appearance of Halley's Comet, and predicted that his death would accompany it as well, dying a day after the comet was at its closest to Earth.
Public Domain Literary Works[]
All published works by Mark Twain from before January 1, 1930 are public domain in the US.
Some notable appearances are listed below:
Novels[]
- The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today (1873)
- The Prince and the Pauper (1881)
- A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (1889)
- The American Claimant (1892)
- Pudd'nhead Wilson (1894)
- Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc (1896)
- A Horse's Tale (1907)
- The Mysterious Stranger (1916, posthumous)
Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn[]
- The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876)
- Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884)
- Tom Sawyer Abroad (1894)
- Tom Sawyer, Detective (1896)
- "Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer Among the Indians" (c. 1884, 9 chapters, unfinished)
- "Huck Finn" (c. 1897, fragment)
- "Schoolhouse Hill" (in The Mysterious Stranger) (c. 1898, 6 chapters, unfinished)
- "Tom Sawyer’s Conspiracy" (c. 1899, 10 chapters, unfinished)
- "Tom Sawyer’s Gang Plans a Naval Battle" (c. 1900, fragment)
Adam and Eve[]
- "Extracts from Adam's Diary", illustrated by Frederick Strothmann (1904)
- "Eve's Diary", illustrated by Lester Ralph (1906)
Short Stories[]
- "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County" (1865)
- "General Washington's Negro Body-Servant" (1868)
- "Cannibalism in the Cars" (1868)
- "A Medieval Romance" [1868] (unfinished)
- "My Late Senatorial Secretaryship" (1868)
- Mark Twain vs Blondin 1869 satire letter
- "A Ghost Story" (1870)
- "A True Story, Repeated Word for Word As I Heard It" (1874)
- "Some Learned Fables for Good Old Boys and Girls" (1875)
- "The Story Of The Bad Little Boy" (1865)
- "The Story Of The Good Little Boy" (1875)
- "A Literary Nightmare" (1876)
- "A Murder, a Mystery, and a Marriage" (1876)
- "The Canvasser's Tale" (1876)
- "The Invalid's Story" (1877)
- "The Great Revolution in Pitcairn" (1879)
- "1601: Conversation, as it was by the Social Fireside, in the Time of the Tudors" (1880)
- "The McWilliamses and the Burglar Alarm" (1882)
- "The Stolen White Elephant" (1882)
- "Luck" (1891)
- "Those Extraordinary Twins" (1892)
- "Is He Living Or Is He Dead?" (1893)
- "The Esquimau Maiden's Romance" (1893)
- "The Million Pound Bank Note" (1893)
- "The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg" (1900)
- "A Double Barrelled Detective Story" (1902)
- "A Dog's Tale" (1904)
- "The War Prayer" (1905)
- "Hunting the Deceitful Turkey" (1906)
- "A Fable" (1909)
- "Extract from Captain Stormfield's Visit to Heaven" (1909)
- "My Platonic Sweetheart" (1912, posthumous)
Short Story Collections[]
- The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County and Other Sketches (1867), short story collection
- Mark Twain's (Burlesque) Autobiography and First Romance (1871), short story collection
- Sketches New and Old (1875), short story collection
- A True Story and the Recent Carnival of Crime (1877), short story collection
- Punch, Brothers, Punch! and Other Sketches (1878), short story collection
- Mark Twain's Library of Humor ("Humour" for the UK edition) (1888), short story collection
- Merry Tales (1892), short story collection
- The £1,000,000 Bank Note and Other New Stories (1893), short story collection
- The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories (1906), short story collection
- The Curious Republic of Gondour and Other Whimsical Sketches (1919, posthumous), short story collection
Essay Collections[]
- Memoranda (1870–1871), essay collection from Galaxy
- How to Tell a Story and other Essays (1897)
- Europe and Elsewhere (1923, posthumous), edited by Albert Bigelow Paine
Essays[]
- "Advice for Good Little Girls" (1865)
- "On the Decay of the Art of Lying" (1880)
- "The Awful German Language" (1880)
- "Advice to Youth" (1882)
- "The Private History of a Campaign That Failed" (1885). Twain's Civil War experiences.
- "Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offenses" (1895)
- "English As She Is Taught" (1897)
- "Concerning the Jews" (1898)
- "My First Lie, and How I Got Out of It" (1899)
- "A Salutation Speech From the Nineteenth Century to the Twentieth" (1900)
- "To the Person Sitting in Darkness" (1901)
- "To My Missionary Critics" (1901)
- "Edmund Burke on Croker and Tammany" (1901)
- "What Is Man?" (1906)
- "Christian Science" (1907)
- "Queen Victoria's Jubilee" (1910)
- "The United States of Lyncherdom" (1923, posthumous)
Non-fiction[]
- The Innocents Abroad (1869), travel
- Roughing It (1872), travel
- Old Times on the Mississippi (1876), travel
- Some Rambling Notes of an Idle Excursion (1877), travel
- A Tramp Abroad (1880), travel
- Life on the Mississippi (1883), travel
- Following the Equator (sometimes titled "More Tramps Abroad") (1897), travel
- Is Shakespeare Dead? (1909)
- Moments with Mark Twain (1920, posthumous)
Other writings[]
- Is He Dead? (1898), play
- The Battle Hymn of the Republic, Updated (1901), satirical lyric
- King Leopold's Soliloquy (1905), satire
- Little Bessie Would Assist Providence (1908), poem
- Slovenly Peter (1935, posthumous), children's book
- Some Thoughts on the Science of Onanism (1879), a speech given to The Stomach Club
- The Mammoth Cod (1902), bawdy humor
Public Domain Appearances[]
All published appearances of Mark Twain from before January 1, 1930 are public domain in the US.
Some notable appearances are listed below:
Public Domain Comic Appearances[]
- It Really Happened #10
- True Comics #35
- Intimate Love #8
- Real Life Comics #19
- Jumbo Comics #117
- Hit Comics #39
- Romantic Marriage #4
- Daredevil Comics #105
- Kid Eternity #16
- Kid Cowboy #6
- Camp Comics #1
- Little Max Comics 322
- Famous Stories #2
- Calling All Girls #10
- Amazing Man Comics #17
- Comics on Parade #6
Notes[]
- A list of public domain character created by Mark Twain can be found here.