The Complete Essays of Mark Twain

by Neider, Charles

• ISBN13: 9780306809576
• ISBN10: 0306809575
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2000-11-02
• Publisher: Da Capo Press

Summary

Mark Twain is best known as one of this country's finest humorists and novelists. As this collection confirms, he was one of our finest essayists as well. Gathered here in a single volume, these pieces reveal the complete range of this esteemed American writer and contain some of his best, funniest, and most caustic work. "English as She Is Taught," "What Is Man?," and "Letters to Satan" are among the seventy-seven essays, each featuring Twain's witty, vital, colorful styleand reminding us why, nearly one hundred years after his death, he continues to be one of the most widely read and beloved of all American authors.

Author Biography

Charles Neider is a noted literary critic, editor, and novelist. His many books as editor include Washington Irving’s George Washington: A Biography, The Complete Humorous Sketches and Tales of Mark Twain, The Great West: A Treasury of Firsthand Accountsand The Complete Short Stories of Robert Louis Stevenson. The Complete Essays of Mark Twain, The Autobiography of Mark Twain. He lives in Princeton, New Jersey.

Table of Contents

Introduction	xiii
Two Mark Twain Editorials	1	(6)
Disgraceful Persecution of a Boy	7	(3)
License of the Press	10	(4)
The Sandwich Islands	14	(14)
A Memorable Midnight Experience	28	(8)
English As She Is Taught	36	(12)
Aix, the Paradise of the Rheumatics	48	(11)
At the Shrine of St. Wagner	59	(12)
Mental Telegraphy	71	(16)
The German Chicago	87	(12)
Marienbad, a Health Factory	99	(11)
Switzerland, the Cradle of Liberty	110	(9)
In Defense of Harriet Shelley	119	(36)
How to Tell a Story	155	(5)
Mental Telegraphy Again	160	(6)
What Paul Bourget Thinks of Us	166	(13)
A Little Note to M. Paul Bourget	179	(10)
Queen Victoria's Jubilee	189	(11)
About Play-Acting	200	(8)
Stirring Times in Austria	208	(27)
Concerning the Jews	235	(16)
Diplomatic Pay and Clothes	251	(8)
My Debut as a Literary Person	259	(23)
To the Person Sitting in Darkness	282	(4)
To My Missionary Critics	286	(25)
Thomas Brackett Reed	311	(2)
Saint Joan of Arc	313	(11)
The First Writing-Machines	324	(13)
A Helpless Situation	337
A Humane Word from Satan	332	(1)
A Monument to Adam	333	(2)
What Is Man?	335	(65)
William Dean Howells	400	(7)
Is Shakespeare Dead?	407	(48)
Marjorie Fleming, the Wonder Child	455	(11)
The New Planet	466	(1)
The Old-fashioned Printer	467	(2)
Seventieth Birthday	469	(5)
Taxes and Morals	474	(3)
The Turning-point of My Life	477	(8)
The Death of Jean	485	(10)
How to Make History Dates Stick	495	(22)
A Scrap of Curious History	517	(6)
As Concerns Interpreting the Deity	523	(7)
The Bee	530	(3)
Concerning Tobacco	533	(2)
The Memorable Assassination	535	(9)
A Simplified Alphabet	544	(7)
Taming the Bicycle	551	(7)
Adam's Soliloquy	558	(6)
Advice to Youth	564	(2)
As Regards Patriotism	566	(2)
Bible Teaching and Religious Practice	568	(4)
The Cholera Epidemic in Hamburg	572	(4)
Consistency	576	(7)
Corn-pone Opinions	583	(4)
The Dervish and the Offensive Stranger	587	(3)
Dr. Loeb's Incredible Discovery	590	(3)
Down the Rhone	593	(24)
Dueling	617	(5)
Eve Speaks	622	(2)
The Finished Book	624	(1)
Foreign Critics	625	(2)
Instructing the Soldier	627	(4)
Letters to Satan	631	(5)
The Lost Napoleon	636	(4)
On Speech-making Reform	640	(4)
Samuel Erasmus Moffett	644	(3)
Skeleton Plan of a Proposed Casting Vote Party	647	(3)
Sold to Satan	650	(8)
Some National Stupidities	658	(6)
The Temperance Crusade and Woman's Rights	664	(4)
That Day in Eden	668	(5)
The United States of Lyncherdom	673	(6)
The War Prayer	679	(3)
A Word of Encouragement for Our Blushing Exiles	682	(3)
Letter from the Recording Angel	685	(6)
Index	691	(10)
Index of Titles	701