MARK TWAIN-THE JESTER-1

Mark Twain.

Quite possibly, Samuel Langhorne Clemens ( 1835-1910) was obsessed by his piloting a steamboat on the Mississipi River.He adopted the pen Name of Mark Twain-which in the river boat terminology means 2 Fathoms depth or 12 Feet or 3.6 Metres. Later, he settled in California & became famous as a Journalist & Novelist.During his stay at California, he also worked as a news-paper reporter.

It was here that he gained a national reputation by writing short stories.He had developed a skill in this field & his work " The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County"(1865) was appreciated all over/.In this he had very humorously described the tale of life in the Far West.

Twain later served as a foreign correspondent,collecting his colourful experiences in The Innocents Abroad( 1869).After good foreign stints, he took a number of lecturing assignments in his homeland & was received well.

His most famous novels,written after his childhood in Missouri include The Adventures Of Tom Sawyer (1872), Life on the Mississippi( 1883),The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn ( 1884),and The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson( 1894).In a completely different vein are his historical novels,The Prince and the Pauper (1882) and A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (1889).

Mark Twain's dry idiomatic wit had a lasting effect on the literary scene of America.Late in life,however,suffering from the tragedies of the sudden deaths of his wife and daughter,Mark Twain became embittered and his last works,What is Man? ( 1906) and The Mysterious Stranger (1916) reflected his mental state of pessimism.His personal memoir ,Mark Twain's Autobiography, was published in 1924.

(Next-MT From the British Angle)