The Comic Mark Twain Reader : The most humorous selections from his Stories, Sketches, Novels, Travel Books, and Speeches 038511334X, 9780385113342

Table of contents :
Cover
Inside Flap
Title
Contents
Introduction, by Charles Neider
STORIES
The Notorious Jumping Frog of Calaveras County
Journalism in Tennessee
The Facts in the Great Beef Contract
How I Edited an Agricultural Paper
Experience of the McWilliamses with Membranous Croup
The Invalid’s Story
The McWilliamses and the Burglar Alarm
Playing Courier
SPEECHES
The Fourth of July
Plymouth Rock and the Pilgrims
Woman, God Bless Her!
from The Innocents Abroad (1869)
Glove Purchase in Gibraltar
Parisian Shave
Billfinger
Guide-English
Shortage of Soap
A Sort of People
A Skinning
An Ancient Playbill
Guying the Guides
Turkish Bath
That Girl in Yalta
“Jericho”
A Party of Eight
King Solomon-in-all-his-glory
A Fearless Man
The Benton House
The Great Pyramid of Cheops
Cookery Complaints
A Newspaper Valedictory
from Roughing It (1872)
The Cayote
When the Buffalo Climbed a Tree
A Hundred and Ten Tin Whistles
A Genuine Mexican Plug
Mr. Arkansas
The Great Landslide Case
Buck Fanshaw’s Funeral
The Story of the Old Ram
Fetch Her Outl
Tom Quartz
“Blanketing” the Admiral
The Greeley Correspondence with Erickson
Markiss, King of Liars
A Practical Joke
from A Tramp Abroad (1880)
Jim Baker’s Bluejay Yarn
The Great French Duel
Cholley Adams
The Laborious Ant
Nicodemus Dodge
An American Party
American in Europe
Ascending the Riffelberg
The Awful German Language
from Life on the Mississippi (1883)
Keelboat Talk and Manners
An Incognito Exploded
The House Beautiful
Manufactures
The Art of Inhumation
from Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884)
Pap, His Own Self
The Duke and the Dauphin
SKETCHES AND TALES
Curing a Cold
Aurelia’s Unfortunate Young Man
The Facts in the Case of the Senate Doorkeeper
Female Suffrage
The Facts Concerning the Recent Resignation
My Late Senatorial Secretaryship
Private Habits of Horace Greeley
Last Words of Great Men
A Mystery Cleared Up
The Late Benjamin Franklin
The Reception at the President’s
The Widow’s Protest
About Barbers
A Burlesque Biography
An Encounter with an Interviewer
The Frog Jumping of the County of Calaveras
Punch, Brothers, Punch
Remarkable Gold Mines
A Petition to the Queen of England
A Cure for the Blues
Traveling with a Reformer
Fenimore Cooper’s Literary Offenses
My First Lie, and How I Got Out of It
Amended Obituaries
Sources
Index of Titles
Inside Flap
Back Cover

Citation preview

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THE COMIC.

MARK TWAIN READER Edited b

Glitles Neder For the first time, the best of the humorous pieces of the brilliant and beloved “wild humorist of the Pacific slope” are collected in one volume. Yarns and tall tales, sketches and storand and speeches, ies, lectures InThe works: long excerpts from the HuckleIt, nocents Abroad, Roughing berry Finn, A Tramp Abroad, and Life onthe Mississippi. From his hilarious account of enduring the Turkish Bath to his ascent of the Riffelberg in evening dress, from his observations on “so manifest a humbug as the ant” to his riotous analysis of The Awful German Language, at home or abroad, attacking presidents or pressmen, the comic Mr. Twain’s presence is much in evidence in these pages. True humorist, sardonic and pessimistic genius, “the printer's

apprentice from Hannibal... mascu-

line, personal, sarcastic, tender, nostalgic—and very funny.”

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THE

COMIC

MARK

TWAIN

READER

The Most Humorous Selections from His Stories, Sketches, Novels, Travel Books and Speeches

OTHER BOOKS BY CHARLES

NEIDER

Fiction

Naked Eye The Authentic Death of Hendry Jones The White Citadel Nonfiction

Edge of the World: Ross Island, Antarctica Susy: A Childhood Mark Twain The Frozen Sea: A Study of Franz Kafka

SOME

BOOKS

EDITED

BY

CHARLES

NEIDER

The Autobiography of Mark Twain Mark Twain: Life As I Find It The Adventures of Colonel Sellers, by Mark Twain The Complete Short Stories of Mark Twain The Complete Humorous Sketches and Tales of Mark Twain The Complete Essays of Mark Twain The Travels of Mark Twain The Complete Novels of Mark Twain The Complete Travel Books of Mark Twain George Washington: A Biography, by Washington Irving The Complete Tales of Washington Irving The Complete Stories of Robert Louis Stevenson Short Novels of the Masters Great Short Stories from the World’s Literature Antarctica Man Against Nature

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= as P iad a ee, _ a5 a:

THE COMIC

MARK TWAIN READER THE MOST

HUMOROUS SKETCHES,

SELECTIONS

FROM

HIS STORIES,

NOVELS, TRAVEL BOOKS AND

SPEECHES

Edited with an Introduction and Notes by

CHARLES

NEIDER

Doubleday & Company, Inc. Garden City, New York

1977

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Clemens, Samuel Langhorne, 1835-1910.

The comic Mark Twain reader.

Includes bibliographical references and index. I. Title. PS1302.N37

818’.4’09

Copyright © 1977 by Charles Neider ISBN: 0-385-11334-X Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 76-23785

All Rights Reserved Printed in the United States of America

To

Harold Kuebler

Contents

INTRODUCTION, by Charles Neider STORIES

The Notorious Jumping Frog of Calaveras County Journalism in Tennessee The Facts in the Great Beef Contract How I Edited an Agricultural Paper Experience of the McWilliamses with Membranous Croup The Invalid’s Story The McWilliamses and the Burglar Alerm Playing Courier

26

33 40 47

SPEECHES

The Fourth of July

61

Plymouth Rock and the Pilgrims

64

Woman, God Bless Her!

FROM The Innocents Abroad (1869) Glove Purchase in Gibraltar Parisian Shave Billfinger Guide-English Shortage of Soap A Sort of People A Skinning An Ancient Playbill

72 75 77 82

85 88 go

95

xii

Contents

Guying the Guides Turkish Bath That Girl in Yalta “Jericho” A Party of Eight King Solomon-in-all-his-glory A Fearless Man

101 107 111 113 115 217 120

The Benton House

125

The Great Pyramid of Cheops Cookery Complaints

128 133

A Newspaper Valedictory

134

From Roughing It (1872) The Cayote When the Buffalo Climbed a Tree A Hundred and Ten Tin Whistles A Genuine Mexican Plug Mr. Arkansas The Great Landslide Case Buck Fanshaw’s Funeral The Story of the Old Ram Fetch Her Out! Tom Quartz “Blanketing” the Admiral The Greeley Correspondence with Erickson Markiss, King of Liars A Practical Joke

140 143 148 153 158 162 167 175 180 182 185 193 200 205

From A Tramp Abroad (1880) Jim Baker’s Bluejay Yarn The Great French Duel Cholley Adams The Laborious Ant Nicodemus Dodge An American Party American in Europe Ascending the Riffelberg The Awful German Language

209 214 223 227 231 235 244 252 277

Contents

FROM Life on the Mississippi (1883) Keelboat Talk and Manners

An Incognito Exploded The House Beautiful Manufactures The Art of Inhumation

295 307 312 317 320

FROM Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884) Pap, His Own Self The Duke and the Dauphin SKETCHES

AND

324 335

TALES

Curing a Cold Aurelia’s Unfortunate Young Man The Facts in the Case of the Senate Doorkeeper Female Suffrage The Facts Concerning the Recent Resignation My Late Senatorial Secretaryship Private Habits of Horace Greeley Last Words of Great Men A Mystery Cleared Up The Late Benjamin Franklin The Reception at the President’s The Widow’s Protest About Barbers

A Burlesque Biography An Encounter with an Interviewer The Frog Jumping of the County of Calaveras

340 344 347 352

365 372

378 382 386 388 391

396

397 401 497 412

Punch, Brothers, Punch

418

Remarkable Gold Mines A Petition to the Queen of England A Cure for the Blues Traveling with a Reformer Fenimore Cooper’s Literary Offenses My First Lie, and How I Got Out of It Amended Obituaries

423 425 430

SOURCES INDEX

OF

TITLES

461 473 481

485 487

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