The Literary Digest Obituary Notice
MARK TWAIN
From The Literary Digest
30 April 1910
Anonymous
The tributes called forth by Mark Twain's death show him to have been
regarded not only as an American of the Americans, but as one of the
foremost citizens of the world. "With the exception of Tolstoy," says
The Morning Leader (London), "probably there is no writer whose
death would rouse more universal emotions of respect and regret." Mr.
Hamlin Garland is reported through the press as saying that he was "as
distinctly American as Walt Whitman." "The work of most writers could
be produced in any country," he adds, "but I think we, as well as
everybody in foreign lands, will look upon Twain's work as being as
closely related to this county as the Mississippi River itself."
Indeed, the Mississippi seems somehow to symbolize him and he it. A
dispatch from Paris voices one of the most poignant expressions of
personal loss among the many that now fill the papers. Mr. C. B. M.
Farthing, friend and schoolmate of Mark Twain, and the original
Huckleberry Finn, said when told of his loss:
"The old days are passing. The men who made them are
gone, and even the long sweep of the majestic yellow river seems to have
dwindled and lessened. The noise of its traffic, the music of its many
deep-throated voices are practically no more. The man who caught them
and froze them into human words for the delight of the world is
dead."
One of those upon whom the mantle of humor which we call "American"
has fallen, George Ade says:
"I read every line Twain wrote, for he was a kind of
literary god to me. His influence has already worked itself into the
literature of our day. We owe much of our cheerfulness, simplicity, and
hope to him. Most of all, Twain grew old beautifully, showing his
simple, childlike faith for ultimate success throughout all his
adversities."
Among the tributes of personal affection that of President Woodrow
Wilson, of Princeton, is especially appealing:
"All the world knows that in Mark Twain it has lost a
delightful humorist, a man able to interpret human life with a flavor
all his own; but only those who had the privilege of knowing him
personally can feel the loss to the full-the loss of a man of high and
lovely character, a friend quick to excite and give affection; a citizen
of the world, who loved every wholesome adventure of the mind or heart;
an American who spoke much of the spirit of America in speaking his
native thoughts."
"He was one of the most ethical of humorist," says The Daily
News (London), to which The Daily Chronicle (London) adds:
"His aspect of things is in reality serious and his judgment often
peculiarly wise." It is further noted that he had "the ironic gift of
puzzling people and leaving them divided between seriousness and
laughter." The Daily Express (London) thinks "Huckleberry Finn"
his best work.
Samuel Langhorne Clemens was born November 30, 1835, in the little
town of Florida, Monroe County, Mo. His father was accounted a man of
"education and social importance" in the frontier town of that early
day. Three years after the son's birth the family moved to Hannibal on
the Mississippi, where Samuel at twelve years of age first touched
printer's ink. His young life was somewhat adventurous, as the obituary
in the New York Sun recounts:
"He determined that if he must be a printer he would be a
tramp printer, and before he was sixteen he had worked in the
composing-rooms of newspapers in St. Louis, Cincinnati, Philadelphia,
and New York. The river called him back. In 1851 he returned to
Hannibal determined to become a pilot, or as it was called, 'to learn
the river.' This was not an inexpensive matter. Master pilots demanded
$500 to take a cadet and thoroughly instruct him in the business. Young
Clemens could not then pay any premium, but he worked for several years
with the sole end in view, making money as a printer at times, at times
working as a clerk on river-boats. In 1857 he was able to satisfy a
master pilot of his ability to pay the $500 fee, and two years later he
had a pilot's license, his first boat being the Alonso Child
under Captain De Haven.
"In 1862 he enlisted in the Confederate Army of Gen.
Sterling Price, but after a few months he returned to St. Louis to join
his brother Orrin, who had been appointed Secretary of the Territory of
Nevada as his clerk to Carson City.
"Up in Esmeralda County, Nev., near the present Goldfield
mines, in a camp called Aurora, men were finding rich gold quartz in
surface outcroppings, and the excitement of this 'rush' drew Clemens
from his desk in Carson City. The romance of a new mining-camp near the
very peak of the Sierra Nevada addrest the sympathies of the young
adventurer more than the hard work of prospecting for pay
rock.
"He made no discoveries of importance in mining, but he
made many acquaintances with stage-drivers, gamblers, and 'bad' men, all
of whom appear in 'Roughing It.'"
After a year of mining-camp life he returned to newspaper work on the
staff of The Enterprise in Virginia City, Nev. It was here that
some of his broadly humorous articles appeared over the signature "Mark
Twain," and were copied widely by papers of the Pacific Coast.
Then:
"The San Francisco Call made an offer to
the writer of the Mark Twain stories, and Clemens in 1865 went on The
Call staff, but he remained there only six months, for the
mining-camp called again. In Calaveras County, Cal., he found little
gold dust, but he did find material for stories which gave him his first
fame east of the Rockies, the stories in the book 'The Jumping Frog of
Calaveras County.'
"In 1866 Clemens went to the Sandwich Islands and wrote
from there some sketches for the Sacramento Union, which sketches
were the basis for his first lectures delivered in San Francisco after
his return from Honolulu.
In the following year the stories of the 'Jumping Frog' book were
published, and Mark Twain became known in the Eastern States as a writer
of exaggerated humor. It was the reputation these stories gained for
him that prompted some newspapers editors to select Mr. Clemens to go
with a party of tourists on a journey abroad and write for his employers
what would now be called a 'syndicate' letter. This trip resulted
(1869) in the publication of 'Innocents Abroad,' an extended revision of
the letters, and with the instant success of that book the writer became
famous in this country and most of the countries of Europe.
"In spite of the very profitable sales of the book, which
would have warranted the author in devoting all his time to
book-writing, he soon after his return from that now famous trip became
editor of the Buffalo Express. This was probably in pursuance
of a contract entered into before the trip to Europe. He remained in
Buffalo only two years, marrying there Miss Olivia Langdon, whose
acquaintance he had made on the ocean voyage.
"Mr. Clemens went to Hartford to live, and at once began
work the material he had gathered while he was not gathering other pay
ore in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, and out of that material came the
book 'Roughing It.' This fixt his reputation as a story-teller and
humorist, and his work was urgently demanded by editors on both sides of
the ocean. Contributing frequently to magazines, he wrote also in the
following year, collaborating with Charles Dudley Warner, 'The Gilded
Age,' which was soon successfully dramatized.
"Next came from his pen what many Americans and nearly
all English critics consider his best work of fiction, 'The Adventures
of Tom Sawyer.' (1876).
"After writing several other books Mr. Clemens in 1884
invested largely in the publishing enterprise of the Charles L. Webster
Company, which had contracted to pay Mrs. Grant $500,000 for the
copyright of General Grant's autobiography. Ten years later the failure
of this firm left Mr. Clemens in debt far beyond his
resources.
"It was believed by his friends and advisers that a
round-the-world lecture tour would help to recoup Mr. Clemens, and the
tour was undertaken. Its success was vastly beyond the most hopeful
expectations; the author was received everywhere with high social and
sometimes with civic honors; his lectures were everywhere attended by
delighted crowds and frequently delivered under the 'patronage' of the
most distinguished people. The profits of the tour enabled Mr. Clemens
to pay every cent he owed and left him a considerable
balance."
Mark Twain's later books were: "A Yankee at the Court of King
Arthur," 1889; "The American Claimant," 1892; "The 1,000,000 Bank
Note," 1893; "Pudd'nhead Wilson," 1894; "Tom Sawyer Abroad," 1894; "Joan
of Arc," 1896; "More Tramps Abroad," 1897; "The Man That Corrupted
Hadleyburg," 1900; "Christian Science," 1907.
