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    08/09/2024
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    Innocents Abroad

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    Chapter: 48 | Listen:

    Writer/entertainer Garrison Keillor (A Prairie Home Companion) on “The Innocents Abroad”: “…one of the best selling travel books of all time.” (The Writer’s Almanac, June 8, 2012) When you dive into Mark Twain’s (Samuel Clemens’) The Innocents Abroad, you have to be ready to learn more about the unadorned, ungilded reality of 19th century “touring” than you might think you want to learn. This is a tough, literary journey. It was tough for Twain and his fellow “pilgrims”, both religious and otherwise. They set out, on a June day in 1867, to visit major tourist sites in Europe and the near east, including Greece, Turkey, Lebanon, Syria, “the Holy Land”, and Egypt. What Twain records, in often humorous, sometimes grotesque but always fascinating detail, are the day-to-day ups and downs of discovering the truth about people and places. The truths they learn are often far different than their education and rumor have made them preconceive. This is a voyage of discovery. It’s long and, in places, tiresome. But it’s revelatory about so much. As with some of his other works, Twain includes popular prejudices of his time, which are today considered socially unacceptable. His references to “Indians”, “Negroes” and “infidels” come to mind. Beyond the lows, though, there are the highs of Twain’s cutting wit and insight as he guides us along the bumpy and often dangerous voyage. No need to buckle up. Just take it slow, and steady…like the journey itself. (Summary by John Greenman)     [chương_files]  

    31/07/2024
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    Goldsmith’s Friend Abroad Again

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    Chapter: 4 | Listen:

    This satire on the U.S.A.’s myth of being the “Home of the Oppressed, where all men are free and equal”, is unrelenting in its pursuit of justice through exposure. It draws a scathingly shameful portrait of how Chinese immigrants were treated in 19th century San Francisco. (Introduction by John Greenman)     [chương_files]  

    30/07/2024

    Letters of Mark Twain, Complete

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    Chapter: 51 | Listen:

    These letters were arranged in two volumes by Albert Bigelow Paine, Samuel L. Clemens’s literary executor, as a supplement to Mark Twain, A Biography, which Paine wrote. They are, for the most part, every letter written by Clemens known to exist at the time of their publication in 1917. They begin with a fragment of a letter from teenaged Sam Clemens to his sister, Pamela, and conclude with a letter to his attorney two weeks before his death. These letters give us some degree of insight into the evolution of Twain’s style of speech and prose over the period of his lifetime; they are a small window into the psyche that created the various characters of his stories. But they also reveal the tragedies of his life: the lack of success in his business ventures, the passing of family. And as I read each one in this collection, I can almost detect the faint odor of one of his “devilish” cigars wafting across the room. (Introduction by James K. White)     [chương_files]  

    26/07/2024

    Mark Twain’s Journal Writings, Volume 1

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    Chapter: 11 | Listen: 3

    Volume 1 contains these 12 essays: 1.) “Americans on a Visit to the Emperor of Russia.” 2.) “The Austrian Edison keeping school again” 3.) “The Canvasser’s tale.” 4.) “The Czar’s Soliloquy.” 5.) “English as She is Taught.” 6.) “Grasses in the South.” 7.) “Hawaii.” 8.) “A Helpless Situation.” 9.) “How I Escaped being Killed in a Duel.” 10.) “Important to Whom it may Concern.” 11.) “The Austrian Edison Keeping School Again” 12.) “Jim’s Investments, and King Sollermun.”     [chương_files]  

    23/07/2024

    Mark Twain’s Speeches

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    Chapter: 105 | Listen: 1

    Spanning the time between 1872 and the year before he died, this collection of after-dinner speeches, random thoughts to “the press”, etc. clearly documents, once again, the truly eclectic mind of Samuel Clemens. It also demonstrates how he dealt with adulation, compliments and notoriety…head on! This collection is a treasure-trove of Twain sayings, witticisms and pronouncements on a huge galaxy of issues and concerns in his life.     [chương_files]  

    23/07/2024

    How to Tell a Story, and Other Essays

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    Chapter: 3 | Listen:

    In his inimitable way, Mark Twain gives sound advice about how to tell a story, then lets us in on some curious incidents he experienced, and finishes with a trip that proves life-changing.     [chương_files]  

    22/07/2024

    Fenimore Cooper’s Literary Offences

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    Chapter: 1 | Listen: 2

    This is Mark Twain’s vicious and amusing review of Fenimore Cooper’s literary art. It is still read widely in academic circles. Twain’s essay, Fenimore Cooper’s Literary Offenses (often spelled “Offences”) (1895), particularly criticized The Deerslayer and The Pathfinder. Twain wrote at the beginning of the essay: ‘In one place in Deerslayer, and in the restricted space of two-thirds of a page, Cooper has scored 114 offenses against literary art out of a possible 115. It breaks the record.’ Twain listed 19 rules ‘governing literary art in domain of romantic fiction’, 18 of which Cooper violates in The Deerslayer. (Introduction by Wikipedia and John Greenman)     [chương_files]  

    22/07/2024

    The Curious Republic of Gondour and Other Whimsical Sketches

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    Chapter: 12 | Listen: 4

    As the title reveals, these stories are a collection of some of Mark Twain’s more fanciful and eccentric works. They run the gamut from political commentary to our species’ need to “be remembered” somehow. Taken as a whole the stories are “whimsical”. Taken individually, they speak the truth in different ways. (Introduction by John Greenman)     [chương_files]  

    21/07/2024
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    Anti-imperialist writings

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    Chapter: 11 | Listen: 2

    This audiobook is a collection of Mark Twain’s anti-imperialist writings (newspaper articles, interviews, speeches, letters, essays and pamphlets).     [chương_files]  

    21/07/2024
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    Essays on Paul Bourget

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    Chapter: 2 | Listen: 1

    Collection of short essays concerning French novelist and critic Paul Bourget. Included: “What Paul Bourget Thinks of Us” and “A Little Note to M. Paul Bourget”.     [chương_files]