Mark Twain
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The Satirical and Bitter Side of Mark Twain. "Man is made of dirt, I saw him made. I am not made of dirt. Man is a museum of diseases, a home of impurities, he comes today and is gone tomorrow, he begins as dirt and departs as stench. I am of the aristocracy of the Imperishables. And man has the Moral Sense. You understand? He has the Moral Sense. That would seem to be difference enough between us, all by itself." The Mysterious Stranger and Other...
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"The classic boyhood adventure tale, updated with a new introduction by noted Mark Twain scholar R. Kent Rasmussen In recent years, neither the persistent effort to "clean up" the racial epithets in Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn nor its consistent use in the classroom have diminished, highlighting the novel's wide-ranging influence and its continued importance in American society. An incomparable adventure story, it is a vignette of...
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Presents Mark Twain's authentic and unsuppressed voice, brimming with humor, ideas, and opinions, and speaking clearly from the grave as he intended.
"I've struck it!" Mark Twain wrote in a 1904 letter to a friend. "And I will give it away to you. You will never know how much enjoyment you have lost until you get to dictating your autobiography." Thus, after dozens of false starts and hundreds of pages, Twain embarked on his "Final (and Right) Plan"...
5) Roughing it
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Originally published over one hundred years ago, "Roughing It" tells the (almost) true story of Mark Twain's rollicking adventures across the United States. A hilarious account of how the author tried finding wealth in the rocks of Nevada, it was published before his most famous works and shows why he would grow to become one of the most beloved American writers of all time. The story follows many of Twain's early adventures, including a visit to...
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A memoir of the steamboat era on the Mississippi River before the American Civil War. The first half details a brief history of the river from its discovery by Hernando de Soto in 1541 and describes Twain's career as a Mississippi steamboat pilot, the fulfillment of a childhood dream. The second half of Life on the Mississippi tells of Twain's return, many years after, to travel the river from St. Louis to New Orleans. By then the competition from...
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"The book relates the tale of Hank Morgan, an engineer from 19th century Hartford Connecticut, who is inexplicably transported to the early medieval England of King Arthur. While there he uses his knowledge of modern technology to appear as though he is a magician. Despite his best intentions, Hank?s attempts to modernize the past bring about a tragic end. A bittersweet depiction of the Arthurian legend through the eyes of a 19th century American..."...
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"A Tramp Abroad" is a work of travel literature, including a mixture of autobiography and fictional events, by American author Mark Twain, published in 1880. The book details a journey by the author, with his friend Harris (a character created for the book, and based on his closest friend, Joseph Twichell), through central and southern Europe. While the stated goal of the journey is to walk most of the way, the men find themselves using other forms...
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Regarded by many as the most luminous example of Twain's work, this historical novel chronicles the French heroine's life, as purportedly told by her longtime friend - Sieur Louis de Conte. A panorama of stirring scenes recount Joan's childhood in Domremy, the story of her voices, the fight for Orleans, the splendid march to Rheims, and much more. An amazing record that disclosed Twain's unrestrained admiration for Joan's nobility of character, the...
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"Mark Twain created the memorable characters Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn drawing from the experiences of boys he grew up with in Missouri. Set by the Mississippi River in the 1840's, it follows these boys as they get into predicament after predicament. Tom's classic whitewashing of the fence has become part of American culture, and the book paints a nostalgic picture of life in the middle of the nineteenth century. Tom runs away from home to an...
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"Based on a series of letters Mark Twain wrote from Europe for San Francisco and New York newspapers as a roving correspondent, The Innocents Abroad (1869) is a caricature of the sentimental travel books popular in the mid-nineteenth century. Mark Twain's fresh and humorous perspective on hallowed European landmarks lacked reverence for the past, and was as mocking about American manners (including his own) as it was about European attitudes. Twain...
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Children's illustrated classics volume no. 80
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In this amusing satire of Renaissance England, Mark Twain relates a story of Edward IV, son of Henry VIII who was England's boy king, and Tom Canty, his pauper look-alike. In the story the boys become acquainted and exchange clothes and life styles in order to learn how the other lives.
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Roxana, a light-skinned slave nurse on a large Southern plantation, is desperate to give her son a better chance at life than she had ever enjoyed, and so she switches him with the master's son. Years later, when Roxana's real son has turned to gambling, murder, and theft, it is the country lawyer, Pudd'nhead Wilson, who unmasks the true identity of the two. Considered Twain's most courageous work, this short novel is one of the most sensitive treatments...
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Known as one of American literature's finest humor writers, Mark Twain took on the travel genre in the series of essays, sketches, and observations collected in The Innocents Abroad. From classic fish-out-of-water shenanigans to keen insight into the differences between American culture and its European and Middle Eastern counterparts, this volume is an engaging and rewarding read.
16) A Dog's Tale
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Why are they taking me away from my mother? Please someone stop them!
Imagine the pain of being separated from your loving mother as a young child. This is exactly what the poor puppy Aileen had to face.
Aileen Mavourneen is a St. Bernard and collie cross puppy who thinks of herself as a Presbyterian because that is what her mother had told her. At first, life for Aileen seems perfect with her new family until a fire breaks out in the house of her...
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In this representative volume, "The Mysterious Stranger and Other Stories" the reader will find twenty-four of Mark Twain's best shorter works. Classic and unforgettable tales that span the author's career are included, such as "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County", which is Twain's most famous short story and was his first great success as an author. It is the unforgettable tale of Jim Smiley, the gambler who will bet on anything including...
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Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn attempts to solve a mysterious murder which takes them onboard a steamboat back to Arkansas, gets them tangled up with diamond thieves and the ghost of a missing burglar. In this burlesque of the immensely popular detective novels of the time Tom and Huck find themselves with Uncle Silas and his family again (see "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn"). Like the two preceding novels, the story is told using the first...
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Samuel Langhorne Clemens (1835—1910), more commonly known under the pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, lecturer, publisher and entrepreneur most famous for his novels "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" (1876) and "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" (1884). First published in 1897, Twain's travel book "Following the Equator - A Journey Around the World" chronicles his 1895 tour of the British Empire when he was 60 years old. Fundamentally...
