Young Age
Orion, the oldest child of the Clemens family, returned from St. began a weekly newspaper in St. Louis, Missouri. Henry, Sam and Henry’s younger brother, worked for him until he purchased the Hannibal Journal a year later. Sam was a skilled typist who occasionally contributed articles and drawings to his brother’s newspaper. Eastern newspapers and periodicals published early sketches from that time period, such as “The Dandy Frightening the Squatter” (1852). When Orion was absent in 1852, Clemens took over as editor and signed a drawing, “W. Emmanuella’s Adrastea Perkins. This was the first time he is known to have used a pen name, and he would use several others (Thomas Jefferson Snodgrass, Quintus Curtis Snodgrass, Josh, and others) before settling on Mark Twain as his legal name.
Literary sophistication on the level of Mark Twain
The following years were crucial for Clemens. He stated that he felt “called to literature of a low order i.e. e. humorous. It’s not anything to be particularly proud of, but it’s my strongest suit,” he continued. He may have hated his job, but it appears he was committed to building a successful career for himself.
Even though he continued to work as a journalist for newspapers, traveling to Hawaii to write for the Sacramento Union and also contributing to publications in New York, it seemed like he was looking for something more. He started his first lecture tour in 1866, focusing mainly on the Sandwich Islands (Hawaii) at the time. Even though he found touring exhausting, he knew that since it was a success, he could use the lecture stage whenever he needed money for the rest of his life. He attempted to publish a book in the interim that was made up of his letters from Hawaii, but was unsuccessful.
He actually published his first book in 1867, The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County and Other Sketches, but sales were not particularly strong. He moved to New York City that year and began working as a traveling correspondent for publications in both San Francisco and New York. The opportunity to expand both his reputation and his audience came with the announcement of a transatlantic trip to Europe and the Holy Land. The Alta paid the expensive fare in exchange for 50 letters he would write about the trip. The Innocents Abroad (1869) was the title given to his account of the journey. In other words, a resounding success.
Older Age
Towards the end of 1894, The Tragedy of Muttonheads Wilson and The Comedy of Those Extraordinary Twins were both published. Buttonhead Wilson, a fascinating, if ambiguous, examination of how race is constructed socially and legally, is set in the antebellum South and centers on the fates of transposed babies, one of whom is white and the other Black. It also reflects Twain’s opinions on determinism, a subject that would preoccupy him for the rest of his life. In that book, one of the maxims is, “Training is everything,” which humorously expresses his point of view. The peach was once a sour almond, and the cauliflower is just cabbage with a college degree. Despite his unexpected turn of events, it was clear that Twain had kept his sense of humor. He was, however, also annoyed by his financial predicament and by the fact that most people only saw him as a comic. The Mark Twain persona had almost come to be seen by Samuel Clemens as a curse.
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