The Life of Mark Twain
The Middle Years, 1871–1891
-
-
5.0 • 1 Rating
-
-
- $46.99
-
- $46.99
Publisher Description
Choice Outstanding Academic Title for 2020
The second volume of Gary Scharnhorst’s three-volume biography chronicles the life of Samuel Langhorne Clemens between his move with his family from Buffalo to Elmira (and then Hartford) in spring 1871 and their departure from Hartford for Europe in mid-1891.
During this time he wrote and published some of his best-known works, including Roughing It, The Gilded Age, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, A Tramp Abroad, The Prince and the Pauper, Life on the Mississippi,Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court.
Significant events include his trips to England (1872–73) and Bermuda (1877); the controversy over his Whittier Birthday Speech in December 1877; his 1878–79 Wanderjahr on the continent; his 1882 tour of the Mississippi valley; his 1884–85 reading tour with George Washington Cable; his relationships with his publishers (Elisha Bliss, James R. Osgood, Andrew Chatto, and Charles L. Webster); the death of his son, Langdon, and the births and childhoods of his daughters Susy, Clara, and Jean; as well as the several lawsuits and personal feuds in which he was involved. During these years, too, Clemens expressed his views on racial and gender equality and turned to political mugwumpery; supported the presidential campaigns of Grover Cleveland; advocated for labor rights, international copyright, and revolution in Russia; founded his own publishing firm; and befriended former president Ulysses S. Grant, supervising the publication of Grant’s Memoirs.
The Life of Mark Twain is the first multi-volume biography of Samuel Clemens to appear in more than a century and has already been hailed as the definitive Twain biography.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In the scrupulously chronicled second installment of an expected three-part biography (after The Life of Mark Twain: The Early Years, 1835 1871), Scharnhorst, professor emeritus of English at the University of New Mexico, reconstructs the period during which Samuel Clemens aka Mark Twain wrote many of his most popular works, including Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. Picking up with a now world-renowned Twain moving to Elmira, N.Y., Scharnhorst humanizes rather than lionizes his subject, who struggles with writer's block, sends amorous letters to his wife while on tour, and basks in constant attention while harrumphing he'd rather be left alone. However, Scharnhorst is careful not to bowdlerize Twain, resisting modern attempts to exonerate him of the anti-Asian prejudice in the play Ah Sin, co-written with Bret Harte. Unnecessarily weighed down by exhaustive research, the book's tendency to linger over minute details detracts from the vivid drama at its heart, in which, as Twain's fame and notoriety grows, he proves unable to resist speculating in disastrous ventures, leading to his and his family's departure from their Hartford, Conn., mansion for financial exile in Europe. Despite some flaws, this remains a masterful, detailed account of America's most famous literary wit.
Customer Reviews
Beautiful
So much detail, and yet it flows so smoothly. Scharnhorst is absolutely right that this story needed three volumes — otherwise it would have been rushed, and it’s actually the wealth of detail that makes it so interesting and memorable.
After the first volume, I wasn’t sure Scharnhorst even liked Sam Clemens. After the second, it’s clear to me how irrelevant a question that is. He’s presenting Sam (as he refers to him throughout) as he is, and what we make of it is our business. He’s not always such a nice guy. He took against people at the drop of a hat and was often blind to his own contributions to their mutual problems.
This is the crucial period from a writing standpoint — the years of Tom Sawyer, Life on the Mississippi, Huck Finn, Connecticut Yankee. (It’s also the time of the Paige Typesetter and the descent into bankruptcy.) And while Scharnhorst keeps his own literary opinions to a minimum— mostly he quotes from positive and negative contemporary reviews— he does provide distinctive and useful insights into all these works.
Hope I’m around long enough for Volume 3. When it’s done, it’s going to be the gold standard. So far it’s been an immensely enjoyable ride. It’s made me want to go back and read everything Mark Twain ever wrote.