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Mark Twain

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" I came in with Halley's Comet in 1835. It is coming again next year, and I expect to go out with it." — Mark Twain

Mark Twain in his old age
Mark Twain in his old age

Samuel Langhorne Clemens (1835 - 1910), better known by the pen name Mark Twain, was an American humanist, humorist, satirist, lecturer and writer. He is most noted for his novels Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (since, called the Great American Novel), and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. American author William Faulkner called Twain "the father of American literature."


2.   Born in Florida, Missouri, Twain's family moved to Hannibal when he was four. The town would later serve as the inspiration for the fictional town of St. Petersburg in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. At that time, Missouri was a slave state in the Union, and young Twain became familiar with the institution of slavery, a theme he later explored in his writing.


3.   In 1847, when Twain was 11, his father died of pneumonia and he became a printer's apprentice the following year. In 1851, he began working as a typesetter and contributor of articles and humorous sketches for the Hannibal Journal, a newspaper owned by his brother, Orion. When Twain was 18, he left Hannibal to work as a printer. At 22, he returned to Missouri. On the voyage down the Mississippi, Twain was inspired by the steamboat pilot to pursue a similar career. He served as a river pilot until the American Civil War broke out in 1861, when traffic was curtailed.


4.   Twain and his brother then traveled across the Great Plains and the Rocky Mountains. His journey ended in the silver-mining town of Virginia City, Nevada, where he became a miner. Failing as a miner, Twain found work at a Virginia City newspaper, the Territorial Enterprise. He then traveled to San Francisco, California, where he continued as a journalist and began lecturing. In 1867, a local newspaper funded a steamboat trip to the Mediterranean. During his tour of Europe and the Middle East, Twain wrote a popular collection of travel letters which were compiled as The Innocents Abroad in 1869.

Tribute to Mark Twain  (Video credit: alexanspaugh)

5.   Twain married Olivia in Elmira, New York in February 1870. She came from a "wealthy but liberal family" and through her, Twain met abolitionists, "socialists, principled atheists and activists for women’s rights and social equality". The couple's marriage lasted 34 years, until Olivia's death in 1904. In 1894, Twain filed for bankruptcy after the publishing company which he owned as a co-partner, failed. Twain made a second tour of Europe, described in the 1880 book, A Tramp Abroad. He returned to America in 1900, having earned enough to pay off his debts.


7.   In 1906, Twain began his autobiography in the North American Review. Oxford University awarded him an Doctorate of Literature a year later. In 1909, Twain is quoted as saying: I came in with Halley's Comet in 1835. It is coming again next year, and I expect to go out with it. Twain died of a heart attack in 1910 in Redding, Connecticut, and was buried in his wife's family plot in Elmira, New York.  more... at Wikipedia



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