Mark Twain 1.Synopsis

2.Mark twain & the

muddy Mississippi

3.Well-known saying

SynopsisU.S. humorist, writer, and lecturer. Original name is “Samuel Lang Horne Clemens.” Born in Florida in 1835; He grew up in near by Hannibal, on the Mississippi River. At 13 he was apprenticed to a local printer. In 1856 he signed on as an apprentice to a steamboat pilot. He plied the Mississippi for almost four years before going to Nevada and California, where he wrote the story that made him famous, "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County" (1865). In 1863 he took his pseudonym, the riverman's term for water "two fathoms deep." He traveled widely as a successful lecturer and to obtain material for his writing,

incl. The

humorous narratives The Innocents Abroad (1869) and Roughing It (1872). He won a worldwide audience for his stories of youthful adventures, especially Tom Sawyer (1876), The Prince and the Pauper (1881), Life on the

Mississippi (1883), and Huckleberry Finn (1884), one of the masterpieces of Amer. Fiction, The satirical A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (1889) and increasingly grim works incl. Pudd'nhead Wilson (1894) and The Man Who Corrupted Hadleyburg (1900) followed. In the 1890s financial speculations bankrupted him and his eldest daughter died. After his wife's death (1904), he expressed his pessimism about human character in such late works as the posthumously published Letters fro

m the Earth (1962).

Mark Twain & the Muddy Mississippi

Before becoming one of America’s greatest writers , Mark Twain was a reporter , a gold digger and a soldier. But it was his experience on the Mississippi River that had the greatest

influence on him and his writing.

In piloting a riverboat, Twain learned to read the river like a book. Things that once seemed unimportant because full of meaning. A beautiful sunset might mean that there would be

windy weather the next day; floating logs often were warnings that the river was rising; and any slanting mark could mean

that a dangerous reef was just below the water’surface.

This knowledge of the river was helpful, but it had its price. Twain experience on the muddy Mississippi cost him his innocence. After years as a riverboat

pilot, he sadly said that “All the grace, the beauty, the poetry, had pone out of the majestic river.”

Mark Twain regretted losing his sense of wonder. This may be why, in so many of his books, Twain’s

characters are children, or uneducated people who are innocent. Twain writes from their point of view

because only they can see the Mississippi as something special.

In “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” two runaways named Huck and Jim travel down the

Mississippi in search of better lives. Though much of the story takes place on the river, Twain saves his

characters from “knowing” it as he did. Jim and Huck travel by raft, and, unable to direct it, they

have many adventures

In most novels, characters learn from their experiences and grow. However, Huck and Jim do

not learn much on their adventures. Is this a weakness in Twain’s book? Perhaps not. By keeping his characters from learning about the rive, Twain is able to share a sense of wonder with his readers of

the muddy Mississippi.

Well-known SayingPrinciples “Principles

is another name for prejudice.” Money “The

lack of money is the root of all evil.”Principles “Principles

is another name for prejudice.” Rich and Poor “If all men were rich, all men would be poor.” Necessity

“Necessity knows no law.”