Mark Twain Forum
Books and Media "Briefly Noted"

Amazon.com Many of the books noted here are available at discounted prices (in association with Amazon.com), and purchases made through this site generate commissions that benefit the Mark Twain Project at the University of California, Berkeley. Titles not listed on this page or in the Mark Twain Forum Reviews section may usually be found by using the search feature in the TwainWeb bookstore.

Books to be considered for review may be sent to:

Barbara Schmidt
Review editor, Mark Twain Forum
220 Choctaw St
Stephenville TX 76401-3818

BOOKS
(arranged alphabetically by author)

  • Baron, Lynne Pauls and Peter Hastings Falk, ed. Luis Mora: America's First Hispanic Master. Hardcover. 344 pages. Falk Art Reference, 2008. ISBN: 978-093208762. $64.95. Baron briefly discusses Mark Twain's connection with artist F. Luis Mora who contributed illustrations to several of Twain's short stories as well as Mark Twain's autobiography when it was serialized in the Sunday Magazine edition of newspapers nationwide between 1907 and 1908. (NONFICTION)

  • Berne, Suzanne. The Ghost at the Table. Hardcover. 292 pages. Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, 2006. ISBN: 1565123344. $23.95. Berne's story about a dysfunctional family over a Thanksgiving weekend features a main character who is a writer working on a book about Mark Twain's daughters. Berne's novel may best be described as a psychological drama with occasional references to the Clemens family. (FICTION.)

  • Blum, Deborah. Ghost Hunters: William James and the Search for Scientific Proof of Life After Death. Hardcover. 371 pages. Penguin Press, 2006. ISBN: 1594200904. $29.95. Blum traces the development of both the British and American Society for Psychical Research (SPR) and examines the lives of the noted scientists and researchers who risked their professional careers to investigate paranormal and psychic phenomena. Mark Twain became a member of the SPR in 1884. Blum provides a valuable historical context for the publication of Twain's "Mental Telegraphy" which appeared in Harper's Monthly December 1891. Blum errs, however, in regard to psychologist Joseph Jastrow's critical response to Twain's article. Jastrow, an opponent of psychical research, wrote "The Logic of Mental Telegraphy" debunking Twain's December 1891 article shortly after it appeared in Harper's. However, Jastrow's article was withheld from publication for four years. Blum dates it as an immediate response appearing in Scribner's January 1892 publication. (Jastrow's article actually appeared four years later in Scribner's November 1895 issue - following Twain's second article "Mental Telegraphy Again" which appeared in the September 1895 Harper's Monthly.) (NONFICTION.)

  • Buchanan, Thomas C. Black Life on the Mississippi: Slaves, Free Blacks, and the Western Steamboat World. Hardcover. 264 pp., 6 1/8 x 9 1/4, 34 illus., 5 tables, 2 maps, appends., notes, bibl., index. University of North Carolina Press, 2004. ISBN 0-8078-2909-9. $32.50. According to the author, the book uncovers the Mississippi River experience personified in Twain's Jim from Adventures of Huckleberry Finn but neglected in Twain's personal reflections in Life on the Mississippi. The introduction chapter and table of contents to this book are online at the publisher's website at http://uncpress.unc.edu/chapters/buchanan_black.html. (NONFICTION)

  • Buffett, Jimmy. A Salty Piece of Land. Hardcover. 480 pages. Little and Brown, 2004. ISBN 0316908452. $27.95. Buffett continues the adventures of his protagonist Tully Mars and his horse Mr. Twain. Mars and Mr. Twain first appeared in Buffett's Tales from Margaritaville. (FICTION)

  • Champlin, Tim. Fire Bell in the Night: A Western Story. Hardcover. 270 pages. Thorndike Press, 2004. ISBN 1594140340. $26.95. The author describes his book as a slightly fictionalized tale of a train trip across America by Rudyard Kipling in 1889. Kipling was a great admirer of Twain and looked him up in Elmira where they spent an afternoon together. "I've used many of the brash, young Kipling's own words as he voices his distaste for most things American. Nearly all of Twain's dialogue is quoted from what Kipling recorded." Kipling and the point of view character have a harrowing adventure on Jackson's Island early in the story when they are visiting Twain's boyhood home town. (FICTION)

  • Champlin, Tim. Swift Thunder. Paperback. 240 pages. Dorchester Publishing Co., 2000. ISBN 0843947586. Also available in hardcover and large print editions. According to the author, "I've quoted Twain's brief account of meeting a Pony Express rider as he was crossing the plains by stagecoach. My character is a Pony Express rider who comes to the aid of a former slave during the Kansas/Missouri border conflict in 1860." (FICTION)

  • Cohen, Rachel. A Chance Meeting: Intertwined Lives of American Artists and Writers, 1854-1967. Hardcover. 384 pages. Random House, 2004. ISBN 1-4000-6164-4. $25.95. Also available in softcover. Cohen's book contains thirty-six chapters on famous writers and artists and their notable acquaintances. Three chapters of approximately ten pages each are devoted to Twain and William Dean Howells, Twain and Ulysses Grant, and Twain and Willa Cather. Cohen acknowledges that her writing is "imaginative nonfiction" wherein she provides her own ideas of what each person thought and said. Separation of facts from conjecture are provided in her endnotes for each chapter. Such conjecture is sometimes confusing as in the case where Cohen describes Willa Cather's attire at Twain's seventieth birthday party as "something simple" and then acknowledges in her endnotes "I don't know what she wore" -- this in spite of the fact that Harper's Weekly published photos of Cather in her dress at the party. Cohen has relied heavily on Justin Kaplan's Mr. Clemens and Mark Twain for much of the material for chapters devoted to Twain. Other chapters are devoted to notables such as Henry James, Mathew Brady, Annie Adams Fields, Walt Whitman, Gertrude Stein, Sarah Orne Jewett, Gertrude Stein, Katherine Anne Porter, Alfred Stieglitz, Hart Crane, Charlie Chaplin, Norman Mailer, Langston Hughes and numerous others. (NONFICTION)

  • Davidson, Loren K. Down the River; or Wildness of Heart. Loren K. Davidson's self-published memoir tells the story of how he and two other young academics from Ohio University, Bob Hogan and John Violette, went in search of Huck Finn's world during the summer of 1957. From raft building in Hannibal to staying on Jackson's Island, the trio finally end up "somewhere in Arkansas." Along the way, the New York Times featured a photo of them on the front page of the June 20, 1957 issue when they paused in St. Louis, Missouri. Davidson and his friends research the river by taking soundings of the river and contacting a number of scholars--Harry Hayden Clark, DeLancy Ferguson, Edward Wagenknecht, Henry Nash Smith, Chester L. Davis, Walter Blair, and August Derleth. Davidson and his traveling companions build a raft from an old dock in Hannibal, Missouri and stock it with maps. As they head south, Davidson documents their trip including all the characters they meet along the way.Davidson reveals that the men argued while on the raft, usually over whose duty it was to row. His documentation of the disintegrating relationship with his fellow academics amounts to side notes in the text. The real gems in Davidson's memoirs are the glimpses he gives of the Mississippi river's culture. As a guide for planning an adventure, _Down the River _ provides plenty of horror stories and warnings. But, as Davidson makes clear, the river will reward each rafter in its own ways; it gives and it takes. Here, the river has given Davidson the opportunity to spin a yarn; but also became the place in which three men became unintelligible to one another. In this respect, Down the River serves as a cautionary tale, a reminder to pick our shipmates well. (NONFICTION)

  • Doctorow, E. L. Creationists: Selected Essays 1993-2006. Hardcover. xiii + 178 pages. Random House, 2006. ISBN: 1400064953. $24.95. Doctorow's collection consists of sixteen previously published essays (some of which have been revised and updated) which examine the nature of creative thought. His essay on Twain titled "Sam Clemens's Two Boys" is a revision of two of his previous essays -- his introduction to The Adventures of Tom Sawyer from the Oxford edition of Twains works (1996) and an essay on Huckleberry Finn that appeared in the June 26 and July 3, 1995 issues of The New Yorker. (NONFICTION)

  • Esbaum, Jill. Ste-e-e-e-eamboat a-Comin'! Illustrated by Adam Rex. Hardcover. 40 pages. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2005. ISBN: 0374372365. $16.00. This volume is geared to young readers ages 4-8; the stylized/realistic artwork of Adam Rex will appeal to Twain lovers of all ages. The book was inspired by chapter four (the "white town drowsing" episode) from Life on the Mississippi and Iowa poet Jill Esbaum has converted Twain's passage into a delightful verse. When the steamboat S. L. Clemens comes to town the community wakes up and adults and children greet the boat and its passengers. A couple of cats and an engaging dog are included. (JUVENILE READER)

  • Garcia, Manuel. Mark Twain in St. Louis: A Biographical Tour Through Bellefontaine Cemetery. Softcover. 156 pages (unpaginated). 7 7/8 x 10 x 3/8 inches. Privately published, no ISBN. $15.00 + $2.00 postage. An illustrated guidebook for touring Bellefontaine Cemetery in St. Louis, Missouri. The book was written by cemetery employee Manuel Garcia, formerly of the _St. Louis Dispatch_ newspaper. Garcia has studied Mark Twain's works, correspondence, notebooks and biographies for names of people Twain knew and wrote about who were buried in Bellefontaine cemetery. Garcia's book contains brief biographies and supplemental information along with maps of gravesites (and former gravesites) of such notables as George Horatio Derby; steamboat pilots Beck Jolly, Zebulon Leavenworth, Isaiah Sellers, Horace Bixby and George Ealer; family members such as the Moffetts and Lamptons; Samuel Taylor Glover (the inspiration for attorney Pudd'nhead Wilson); and a host of others who were part of Twain's life. The book will be a valuable research aid for anyone planning a walking research tour of Bellefontaine in St. Louis, Missouri. Information on available copies may be obtained from the author: Manuel Garcia, 43C Quarry Court, Golden Eagle, IL 62036. (NONFICTION)

  • Houle, Michelle M. Mark Twain: Banned, Challenged and Censored. From the Authors of Banned Books series. Enslow Publishers, 2008. Pp. 160. Library binding. $34.60. 6 1/2 x 9 1/4 inches. ISBN-13: 978-0-7660-2689-6. This series typically includes biographical details, literary criticism, history, arguments of those opposed to books and arguments of the books' supporters. Author Michelle M. Houle discusses Twain's life and times and analyzes two of his best known books. She also explores the history of book censorship, outlining why it occurs and possible ways to address it. She helps young readers make up their own minds about whether the books should be banned. Grade levels 9-12. (NONFICTION)

  • Hunt, Samantha. The Invention of Everything Else. Houghton Mifflin, 2008. Pp. 272. Hardcover. $24.00. 9.1 x 5.9 x 1.2 inches. ISBN-13: 978-0618801121. Set in New York in the 1940s, the ghost of Mark Twain makes an appearance in this story about the aging inventor Nikola Tesla.

  • MacLeod, Elizabeth. Mark Twain: An American Star. From the Snapshots: Images of People and Places in History series. Kids Can Press, 2008. Pp. 32. Hardcover. $14.95. 11.1 x 8.6 x 0.4 inches. ISBN 978-1553379089. This book is a short introduction to Mark Twain and is recommended for children with a reading level of ages 9 - 12. It is also available in softcover. (NONFICTION)

  • McClatchy, J. D. American Writers at Home. Photographs by Erica Lennard. Hardcover. 224 pages. Library of America in Association with The Vendome Press, 2004. 12.1 x 10.1 x 0.9". ISBN 1931082758. $50.00. A coffee table book of pictorial tours through the homes of twenty-one American authors ranging from Louisa May Alcott to Walt Whitman. A brief biography is included for each author. Mark Twain's home in Hartford, CT is featured in a span of eleven pages, fifteen color photos and three archival photos. Twain's mini-biography is not without errors. McClatchy copies the error from the Ken Burns documentary on Mark Twain regarding the "I am the American" quote (it was most likely written by Twain about Frank Fuller--not about himself); McClatchy writes that Clara and Jean Clemens were born in the Hartford house (both were born in Elmira); and McClatchy incorrectly attributes the "Lincoln of our literature" quote about Twain as coming from Joseph Twichell (it was written by W. D. Howells). Other homes and writers featured include: Kate Chopin, Emily Dickinson, Frederick Douglass, Ralph W. Emerson, William Faulkner, Robert Frost, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Ernest Hemingway, Washington Irving, Robinson Jeffers, Sarah O. Jewett, Henry W. Longfellow, Herman Melville, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Flannery O'Connor, Eugene O'Neill, Eudora Welty, and Edith Wharton. A bibliography is included. (NONFICTION)

  • Mintz, Stephen. Huck's Raft: A History of American Childhood. Hardcover. 464 pages. Harvard University Press, 2004. ISBN 0674015088. $29.95. Mintz uses a Twain motif for his comprehensive study of American childhood. He writes "Much as the raft is carried by raging currents that Huck can only partly control, so, too, childhood is inevitably shaped and constrained by society, time and circumstances." The book contains 17 chapters (including a chapter on children in slavery titled "Growing Up in Bondage"), black and white photos throughout, end notes and index. Twain is listed on four pages in the index. (NONFICTION)

  • Mort, Terry. Mark Twain on Travel. Hardcover. 304 pages. The Lyons Press, 2005. ISBN: 1592288065. $24.95. This volume is a collection of some of Twain's most popular travel passages from Life on the Mississippi, Roughing It, Following the Equator, The Innocents Abroad, and A Tramp Abroad. Mort has arranged his selections into a geographical trek that begins on the Mississippi River, ventures out to Nevada, onward West to the Sandwich Islands, through the Pacific, India, the Middle East, and Europe. Mort concedes he has occasionally adjusted some of Twain's punctuation for the modern reader. (COLLECTED WRITINGS)

  • Muske-Dukes, Carol. Channeling Mark Twain. Random House, 2007. Pp. 288. Hardcover. $20.99. ISBN 0375509275. This novel, set in New York of the 1970s, features a protagonist who teaches poetry to inmates at the Women's House of Detention on Rikers Island. Among her students are murders and drug addicts and a woman named Polly Lyle Clement. Clement claims to be Mark Twain's great granddaughter and has the ability to channel his voice. Muske-Dukes, an award-winning poet, taught at Rikers Island for several years and the book is dedicated to members of that group. (FICTION)

  • Nasaw, David. Andrew Carnegie. Hardcover. xiv + 878 pages. Penguin Press, 2006. ISBN: 1594201048. $35. Nasaw's massive biography of Carnegie includes a discussion of the friendship between Mark Twain and Andrew Carnegie and reprints portions of a number of letters that were exchanged between the two men. (NONFICTION)

  • Nenortas, Tomas. Victorian Hartford. Softcover. 128 pages. 200 black and white photos. Arcadia Publishing, 2005. ISBN 0738537136. $19.99. From the Postcard History Series, this book features an extensive collection of postcards from 19th century Hartford. Many scenes are of buildings and structures no longer standing and it is likely they were familiar to Samuel Clemens. The book contains ten pictorial sections, including one titled "The Colt Empire and Nook Farm," plus a bibliography and index. (NONFICTION)

  • Oates, Joyce Carol. Wild Nights!: Stories About the Last Days of Poe, Dickinson, Twain, James and Hemingway. Ecco, 2008. Pp. 256. Hardcover. $24.95. 9.3 x 5.6 x 1.2 inches. ISBN-13: 978-0061434792. This book is a collection of stories built around the dying days of famous authors. In a chapter titled "Grandpa Clemens & Angelfish, 1906" Oates focuses on Mark Twain's friendship with adolescent girls. (FICTION)

  • O'Connell, Deirdre. The Ballad of Blind Tom: Slave Pianist, America's Lost Musical Genius. Hardcover. 288 pages. New York and London: Overlook Duckworth, 2009. ISBN: 978-1-59020-143-5. $24.95. O'Connell examines in detail the life of Blind Tom, an autistic savant, as he rose from slavery to his career as a renowned entertainer in the nineteenth century. O'Connell briefly addresses Mark Twain's lifelong fascination with Blind Tom. (NONFICTION)

  • Osmun, Mark Hazard. After the Bones. Softcover. 363 pages. 6 x 9 inches. Twelfth Night Press, 2006. ISBN: 0-9673-0791-0. $16.95. A novel of political intrigue, murder and conspiracy set in the Sandwich Islands (Hawaii) in 1866 featuring Mark Twain in his role as a traveling reporter for the Sacramento Daily Union newspaper. (FICTION)

  • Prince, April Jones. Who Was Mark Twain? Black and white illustrations by John O'Brien. Library binding. 103 pages. Grosset & Dunlap, 2004. ISBN 0448435373. $13.98.Juvenile biography in the "Who Was...?" series from Grossett & Dunlap. The book features a whimsical color graphic for the cover; interior illustrations are black and white line drawings. Amazon.com offers the first chapter online as well as a "search inside this book" capability. (NONFICTION - JUVENILE BIOGRAPHY)

  • Rawles, Nancy. My Jim: A Novel. Hardcover. 176 pages. Crown Publishers, 2005. ISBN 1400054001. $19.95. The author draws upon Twain's character of Jim from Adventures of Huckleberry Finn to create the story of Jim's wife Sadie Watson. The book is written in slave dialect. (FICTION)

  • Rogers, Bob. The Return of No. 44. Paperback. 378 pages. BookSurge Publishing, 2009. ISBN: 1439223483. $15.99. Rogers describes his book as a "homage to Mark Twain's ability to use picaresque characters and situations to make a substantial, and often darker, social point." Mark Twain and his character No. 44 make a brief appearance in the novel. (FICTION)

  • Shannon, Clay. The Resurrection of Samuel Clemens. Softcover. 219 pages. Booksurge, 2001. ISBN 1588985997. $21.25. Largely philosophical treatise set in a utopian future in which Clemens is brought back to resume his life, surrounded by his resurrected relatives. A literate and thoughtful discourse on Clemens by a writer well versed in Clemens's life and works. (FICTION)

  • Tremblay, Paul G. Compositions for the Young and Old. Dominion, 2004. Softcover, 209 pages. $15.00. ISBN: 1-930977-43-4. Tremblay's book is a collection of twenty short stories. One of the stories titled "So Many Things Left Out" is a horror/science fiction story featuring Mark Twain who has been resurrected by voodoo. Tremblay was inspired to write his story by the controversy surrounding the publication of _Jap Herron_ in 1917, a book claimed to have been dictated by Twain via the ouija board, and _Jap Herron_ is a prominent part of the story. Another short story featuring legendary baseball player Ty Cobb is titled "Hackin' at the Peach." This is not a collection of stories for the squeamish. (FICTION - Science fiction/horror)

  • Twain, Mark. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Edited by Lucy Rollin. Softcover. 315 pages. Broadview Press, 2006. ISBN: 1551116529. $9.95. This edition of Mark Twain's novel contains a wealth of introductory material, four appendixes and a bibliography. The supplementary material focuses on composition of the original manuscript, marketing, contemporary reviews; Twain's memories of Hannibal; other "Bad Boys and Boy Books" of the nineteenth century; and "Small Town American Childhood in the 1840s." The publisher's table of contents webpage for this book is:
    http://www.broadviewpress.com/bvcontents.asp?BookID=754

  • Twain, Mark. Graphic Classics: Mark Twain. Second edition. Edited by Tom Pomplun. Eureka Productions, 2007. Pp. 144. 7 x 10", paperback, b&w, 4 color cover. $11.95. ISBN 0-9787919-2-4. This book is the revised second edition of the eighth volume in the Graphic Classics series of comic adaptations of literature. This edition, which replaces the 2004 Mark Twain edition, features "Tom Sawyer Abroad." An illustration from that story is featured on the cover of this edition. "Tom Sawyer Abroad" replaces several works which were dropped in this revised second edition to make room for the new material. Thus, comic book collectors will need both editions to insure having the complete run of Mark Twain's stories converted to comics by Graphic Classics. The first edition of this comic book was reviewed on the Mark Twain Forum in 2004. The review of the first edition is online in the Forum archives. (COMICS)

  • Twain, Mark. Pudd'nhead Wilson. Introduction by Louis J. Budd. Signet Classics, 2007. Pp. 176. Paperback, b&w illustrations. $4.95. ISBN 978-0-451-53074-5. Signet Classics first issued this work in 1964. This 2007 edition features a fresh and insightful introduction by Louis J. Budd. Budd includes references to recent works published by Tom Quirk and Stephen Railton in his introduction. A list of "Selected Biography and Criticism" is also provided.

  • Twain, Mark. Stories for Young People: Mark Twain. Edited by Gregg Camfield. Illustrated by Sally Wern Comport. Hardcover. 80 pages. 10.3 x 9.0 x 0.6 inches. Sterling Publishing, 2005. ISBN: 1402711786. $14.95. With colorful and eye-catching illustrations, this collection (recommended for grades 6-9) will be one that many Twain Forum members will want to add to their own bookshelves. The book includes a brief introduction, "An Encounter with an Interviewer," "The Invalid's Story," "Advice to Youth," "The £1,000,000 Banknote," and "A Fable." There is a short section for word definitions at the bottom of many pages to introduce young readers to vocabulary words which may be new to them.

  • Twain, Mark and Lee Nelson. Mark Twain and Huck Finn Among the Indians. Hardcover. 277 pages. Council Press, 2003. ISBN 1555176801. $18.95. Another attempt to finish Twain's unfinished novel. Also available in audio cassette and cd versions in 2004. (FICTION)

  • Warren, Louis S. Buffalo Bill's America: William Cody and the Wild West Show. Hardcover. 654 pages. Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. ISBN: 0375412166. $30.00. Among items of interest to Twain scholars is the reprinting of the text of an 1884 endorsement from Mark Twain that Cody used in his newspaper advertising. The author provides a brief discussion of how aware Twain was of the artful deceptions in Cody's performances. (NONFICTION)

  • Wagman-Geller, Marlene. Once Again to Zelda: The Stories Behind Literature's Most Intriguing Dedications. Hardcover. 336 pages. Perigee Trade, 2008. ISBN: 0399534628. $16.95. Among the fifty chapters in this book is one on Mark Twain's dedications for The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, The Prince and the Pauper, Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc, and Eve's Diary. This short chapter on Mark Twain contains a brief overview of his life. It does repeat one previously published error that indicated Mark Twain met Mahatma Gandhi in India. There are other minor inaccuracies regarding the Clemens family. (NONFICTION)

  • Wray, John. Canaan's Tongue. Alfred A. Knopf, 2005. Hardcover, 341 pages. $25.00. ISBN: 1-4000-4086-8. Wray's novel, set in 1863, is rooted in the criminal underworld of the infamous slave trader John Murrell. Twain discussed "Murel's Gang" in chapter 29 of Life on the Mississippi and Wray uses passages from Twain's novel to introduce two chapters in Canaan's Tongue. One chapter titled "Samuel Clemens" is a (fictitious) letter written by Clemens to a girl named "Sweet Leah." Clemens's letter describes meeting "the notorious slave bandit Thaddeus Murel" aboard a steamboat piloted by Horace Bixby. (FICTION)

  • Zwick, Jim. Inuit Entertainers in the United States: From the Chicago World's Fair through the Birth of Hollywood. Softcover. 206 pages. Infinity Publishing, 2006. ISBN: 0741434881. $18.95. Zwick, better known in Mark Twain circles as a researcher on Twain's views regarding anti-imperialism, has turned his recent attention to tracking the lives of Inuit performers who were brought to the United States for exhibition in World's Fair expositions. Zwick makes outstanding use of historical newspaper databases to trace the entertainment careers of Esther Eneutseak and her daughter Columbia who was born at the Chicago World's Columbian exposition in 1893. Zwick does not include Twain in this book but includes the parallel on the website for the book. Twain's "The Esquimau Maiden's Romance," first published in the November 1893 issue of Cosmopolitan was almost certainly inspired by the Eskimo Village exhibit at Chicago and the accompanying newspaper reports related to conflicts between managers and the Inuit over their refusal to wear fur in hot weather. Due to illness, Twain did not leave his Chicago hotel room to visit the Chicago World's Fair but he did visit the Charleston Exposition in 1902 and the Jamestown Exposition in 1907 where Esther and her Inuit family were also featured. The website for the book is: http://www.inuitentertainers.com. (NONFICTION)

    JOURNALS

  • American Literary Realism: Special Issue on Mark Twain. Guest editor, Michael J. Kiskis. Volume 41, No. 3, Spring 2009. E-ISSN: 1940-5103. Print ISSN: 0002-9823. $12.00 (U.S.); $15.00 (Non-U.S.). This issue contains five essays by noted Mark Twain scholars: "The voice of Her Laughter: Mark Twain's Tragic Feminism" by Ann M. Ryan; "The Fluid Identity of 'Petrified Man'" by Kerry Driscoll; "'The Trouble Begins at Eight': Mark Twain, the San Francisco Minstrels, and the Unsettling Legacy of Blackface Minstrelsy" by Sharon D. McCoy; "Transcendental Twain: A New Reading of 'What Is Man?'" by Jennifer Gurley; and "'It Was a Pretty High Title': Kantian Ethics in _A Connecticut Yankee_" by Jeffrey W. Miller. Mark Woodhouse also contributes a book review of Forrest G. Robinson's The Author-Cat.

    This journal is available online through Project Muse from many school libraries at this website:
    http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/american_literary_realism/toc/alr.41.3.html

    Single issues are available from the University of Illinois Press. Their contact information is available at this website:
    http://www.press.uillinois.edu/journals/alr.html

  • Arizona Quarterly; Special Issue: Mark Twain at the Turn-of-the-Century, 1890-1910, Volume 61, Number 1, Spring 2005. Softcover, 199 pages. Edited by Shelley Fisher Fishkin and Forrest G. Robinson. $10. This special issue of eight conference papers derives from the Stanford and University of California at Santa Cruz conference held in May 2004. The contents of this special issue are:
  • Firsts: The Book Collector's Magazine, September 2008, Volume 18, No. 7. $5.95. This issue contains "Mark Twain Redux" by Kevin Mac Donnell. This article follows by ten years Mac Donnell's earlier articles which appeared in the July/August and September 1998 issues of Firsts. Mac Donnell looks at the changes that have occurred in the world of Twain collecting in the last decade and how prices have changed. He discusses the impact of the internet on the bookselling industry and reviews some of the most important new volumes in Twain scholarship. The publisher's website for this issue is:
    http://www.firsts.com/Sep08.html

  • Journal of Transnational American Studies. April 2010. JTAS 2.1 features a previously published article by Mark Twain that has not been reprinted since its initial publication in 1868 titled "The Treaty with China." Martin Zehr contributes an analysis of the article in his essay "Mark Twain, 'The Treaty with China,' and the Chinese Connection." JTAS is a peer-reviewed online, open-access journal published by the American Cultures and Global Contexts Center at the University of California-Santa Barbara and the Program in American Studies at Stanford University.

  • Mark Twain Studies: Special Feature I: New Perspectives on 'The War-Prayer' -- An International Forum and Special Feature II: Twain and Asia, Volume 2, October 2006. 192 pages. ISSN 1349-4635. Single issues $23 (which includes shipping.) This English language journal is published by the Japan Mark Twain Society every three years. Shelley Fisher Fishkin has written an introduction for an international round-table discussion on Twain's "The War-Prayer" and provides a corrected text from Twain's manuscript and typescript. Twenty-six essays of several pages each are featured. The essays range in approach from historical to literary to personal. American contributors whose names will be familiar to members of the Mark Twain Forum include Ron Powers, Kevin Mac Donnell, Wesley Britton, Dwayne Eutsey, Martin Zehr, Michael Kiskis, Darryl Brock, and Barry Crimmins.

    The second feature of this issue is a section titled "Twain and Asia" and features three essays: "From 'Mark Twain's Pet' to ''Merican Jap': The Strange Career of Wallace Irwin's Hashimura Togo" by Uzawa Yoshiko; "Not Twain, But Twichell: The Hartford Support System of Edward House's Japanese Students" by Takashima Mariko; and "Representations of the Chinese Other in Mark Twain's World" by Darren Chiang-Schultheiss.

    Single issues can be ordered by sending your name and address and an international money order for $23 to:
    Dr. ISHIHARA Tsuyoshi
    Waseda University, School of Education
    1-6-1 Nishi-Waseda, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo
    169-8050 Japan
    Dr. Ishihara can be emailed at <zu8t-ishr@asahi-net.or.jp>. Domestic money orders or personal checks cannot be accepted.

  • Meridian: The Semi-Annual from the University of Virginia, Issue 15, Spring/Summer 2005. Single issue $7 plus shipping. This issue publishes what is believed to be a previously unpublished Twain manuscript for a speech that was never delivered. The article is one in the Lost Classic series and is titled "An After Dinner Speech: Girard College and Religion." Evidence indicates the speech was written for delivery on February 6, 1889 at Yale University but never used. Graduate student Cory Maclauchlin wrote the introduction to the speech and describes Twain's content as addressing controversial issues of race relations, imperialism, and religion in schools.
    Maclauchlin's introduction is available online via the journal's website at: http://www.engl.virginia.edu/meridian/
    An interview with Maclauchlin and a photo of one page from the manuscript which is owned by the University of Virginia is online at: http://www.virginia.edu/insideuva/classic.html
    Single issues can be purchased from the university bookstore at 800-759-4667 or by contacting the staff through the journal's website at: http://www.engl.virginia.edu/meridian/?page=contact

  • Nevada Historical Society Quarterly, Summer 2008, Volume 51, No. 2. $10.00 plus $2.50 shipping. This issue is devoted to Mark Twain in Nevada. Articles include "Mark Twain in Nevada" by Ronald J. James who is the Nevada State Historic Preservation Officer. James takes Ron Powers and Ken Burns to task for presenting inaccurate views of Nevada in their work.

    Robert E. Stewart, author of Aurora, Nevada's Ghost City of the Dawn has contributed two articles: "Sam Clemens and the Wildland Fire at Lake Tahoe" and "Mark Twain's Return from Aurora." In the first of Stewart's articles he maps out a route from Carson City, Nevada to Lake Tahoe that he believes Clemens traveled in the fall of 1861. This trip was the one when Clemens accidentally started a wildfire on the banks of Lake Tahoe as described in Roughing It. Stewart's second article is an argument for overturning the popular misconception, originated by Twain's biographer Albert Bigelow Paine, that Mark Twain walked from Aurora to Virginia City, Nevada to take his job as an Enterprise reporter in the fall of 1862. Stewart presents evidence that Clemens probably made the trip on horseback accompanied by Frank Fuller.

    David C. Antonucci, author of The Natural World of Lake and Tahoe and Mark Twain at Lake Tahoe has contributed "Mark Twain's Route to Lake Tahoe." Antonucci's proposed route to Lake Tahoe differs from the route proposed by Stewart. It is up to the reader to decide which route may be the correct one and both Antonucci and Stewart are commended for their detailed research.

    Cheryll Glotfelty, co-editor of The Ecocriticism Reader, has contributed a noteworthy short biography of Lawrence I. Berkove who is better known to many Mark Twain Forum subscribers as "Larry." Glotfelty's article "The Recovery of Sagebrush School Writers" discusses Berkove's work in "literary recovery" and his contributions to preservation and recovery of previously lost American literature. She presents an omnibus book review of Berkove's most recent works including his monumental two-volume edition Insider Stories of the Comstock Lode and Nevada's Mining Frontier, 1859-1909 (Edwin Mellen Press, 2007).

    The Reno Gazette Journal has a story about this issue online in their Friday, October 17 edition.

    This issue of Nevada Historical Society Quarterly is available from:
    Nevada Historical Society, 1650 N. Virginia St., Reno, NV, 89503 or by telephone with credit card at 775-688-1190 (press 4 for the store.)

    MEDIA

  • The Adventures of Mark Twain. Musical score by Max Steiner. Performed by Moscow Symphony Orchestra and Chorus; conducted by William Stromberg. Liner notes by Bill Whitaker. Naxos, 2004. 70:49. Audio CD. $6.95. ASIN: B0002TXT5W. This is a soundtrack CD from the 1944 movie based on Mark Twain's life which featured Frederic March as Twain and Alexis Smith as Olivia Clemens. The liner notes include a brief background and history of the movie and Clara Clemens's involvement in the production. Amazon features audio clips from the twenty-nine tracks on the CD. (AUDIO CD)

  • The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, $3.99. Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, $4.99. Blackstone Audio iPhone Audiobook Apps. By Folium Partners. Two new Mark Twain audiobooks developed specifically for the iPhone platform hit the market recently. Developed and distributed by Folium Partners, the Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn Blackstone Audio iPhone apps each feature full-length audiobooks organized by chapter with easy-to-use controls, intuitive designs, and bonus materials that make their $3.99 and $4.99 price tags, respectively, feel like a real bargain. The centerpiece of each app is its unabridged audiobook recording. (The Huck Finn omits the oft-debated "Raftsmen's Passage," however.) Grover Gardner (who reads Tom Sawyer) and Tom Parker (who reads Huckleberry Finn) provide professional readings that are as pleasurable to listen to as they are unobtrusive. Both apps also offer miscellaneous content that includes short biographies of Twain, histories of each text, an assortment of fun quizzes (about such subjects as American history, Mark Twain, the novels and their principal characters) that score themselves, and a variety of Sam Clemens's most famous quotations. One only hopes that with the technology of iPhone network available to app designers, that Blackstone Audio/Folium Partners continue to update these apps (with new quizzes, for example) and additional supplementary features. For more information please visit: http://www.blackstoneaudioapps.com.

  • Discoveries ... America Special Edition, Mark Twain Himself performed by Richard Garey. DVD. 82 minutes. Bennett-Watt HD Productions, Inc., 2005. ISBN 1-932978-14-3. $19.95. This one-man show is performed by actor and Mark Twain impersonator Richard Garey at the historic Planter's Barn Theater in Hannibal, Missouri. It is a one-camera production performed before a small audience. Garey's selections are a mix of both humorous and serious material combined with autobiographical commentary. In an interview with Garey that is included on the DVD, he provides historical context for the Planter's Barn Theater in Hannibal as well as Mark Twain's role in American literature. (DVD NONFICTION)

  • Discoveries ... America Special Edition, Mark Twain's Hannibal: A Homecoming performed by Richard Garey. DVD. 66 minutes. Heritage Stage Productions and Bennett-Watt HD Productions, Inc., 2005. ISBN 1-932978-31-3. $19.95. Mark Twain impersonator Richard Garey takes his act and monologues to the streets of Hannibal, Missouri. Along the way he visits some of the historic homes and buildings, local tourist attractions and main street businesses. Notably absent is any visit to Mount Olivet cemetery or the Hannibal public library--two other sites worthy of mention. This production contains some of the same material from Garey's _Mark Twain Himself_. Some historical errors and local myths are presented as fact such as a childhood friendship between "The Unsinkable" Molly Brown and Sam Clemens. (DVD NONFICTION)

  • Father Murphy - Season 2. Image Entertainment, 2005. Five DVD disks. Color; closed captioned. ASIN B0006L0LIE. $49.99. Included in this collection is episode 25 which was titled "Stopover in a One-Horse Town." The program aired on October 26, 1982, the second season of this television production which starred former professional football player Merlin Olsen. The plot of episode 25 featured Sam Clemens who arrived in town and established a newspaper. (According to Mark Dawidziak in his book Shape of the River, the role of Clemens was played by Christopher Stone.) Young cast regulars joined Clemens as reporters and became the inspiration for Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn. Release date for this item is January 25, 2005. (DVD FICTION)

  • The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg. Monterey Home Video, 2004. Directed by Ralph Rosenblum. 40 minutes. ASIN B0002VGSQW. $24.95. This adaptation of Twain's work originally aired March 17, 1980 on television's "American Short Story" series. The production starred Robert Preston and Fred Gwynne. Critics denounced script writer Mark Harris for eliminating the last portion of Twain's story and leaving the audience with an incomplete version of the work. (DVD FICTION)

  • Mark Twain's America in 3-D. (Originally released in IMAX film format in 1998.) Warner Home Video, 2005. Narrated by Anne Bancroft. Directed by Stephen Low. 53 minutes. ASIN B0006HBV4Q. $14.97. The original production was flawed by factual inaccuracies and could have used more scholarly input. Film reviewer Lawrence Van Gelder for the New York Times declared, "Twain might have enjoyed the film's three-dimensional effects while turning his withering scorn on its pretensions to biography, history and social relevance." The film's redeeming qualities were in the use of stereoscopic archival images, the footage of Twain's Hartford house, the scenes filmed around the town of Hannibal and the musical soundtrack. The awesome 3D effects of IMAX are lost in the transfer to DVD format. Release date for this item is February 1, 2005. (DVD NONFICTION)

  • Mark Twain's "Is Shakespeare Dead?" adapted and performed by Keir Cutler. DVD. 44 minutes. Film West Associates, 2004. School pricing with classroom license is $149.95 + $9.95 shipping. Home video price is $40 + $9.95 shipping. Taped at the 2003 Winnipeg Fringe Festival, Keir Cutler's performance is a one-man show performed on a darkened stage. Cutler, dressed in a barrister's robes, presents Twain's compelling claim (that William Shakespeare did not write the works attributed to him) as though it were the closing argument at a trial. He weaves humour and logic into an enjoyable feat of rhetorical sleight of hand. Even the most devout Stratfordians may reconsider the authority of their idol after seeing Cutler's performance. Keir Cutler will perform "Is Shakespeare Dead?" at New Classical Theatre, Festival Theatre Ste-Catherine, Montreal, Canada from September 6-10, 2005.The publisher's website for this DVD is: http://www.filmwest.com/Catalogue/itemdetail/2860/. Cutler's web site is: http://www.keircutler.com (DVD PERFORMANCE)

  • Veggie Tales: Tomato Sawyer and Huckleberry Larry's Big River Rescue. DVD. 45 minutes. Big Idea, 2008. $14.95. ASIN: B0016MJ6L0. Described as a "Lesson in Helping Others." One of a series of young children's cartoons on DVD featuring vegetables as the leading characters. Tom and Huck live along the banks of the Mississippi. When they meet a stranger who needs their help, they must make some hard decisions. The story features a Twain-like narrator "Clark Wain." (DVD FICTION CARTOON)

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