Autobiography mark twain volume 3

The swan song reinforces things well established by its predecessors. Closes the book on the remarkable life of one of America's most outstanding literary talents. Captivating and invaluable. As such, it is truly fascinating.

Autobiography mark twain volume 3: These volumes of Mark Twain's

Don't loan this book out: you'll never see it again. His crystalline humor and expansive range are a continuous source of delight and awe. Pull up a chair and revel. Frank, Amanda Gagel, Sharon K. Mark Twain. The surprising final chapter of a great American life. When the first volume of Mark Twain s uncensored "Autobiography" was published init was hailed as an essential addition to the shelf of his works and a crucial document for our understanding of the great humorist s life and times.

As noted by others, this volume tends to cover the last years, the most recent years for Clemens, though his does cover his early "cub reporter years" here. A full quarter the last pages are the Ashcroft-Lyons betrayal, which perhaps is overblown but certainly wounded and preoccupied Clemens deeply as his wife and daughters began dying. Livia probably was in distinct charge of family finances and led to the blind spot of the Ashcroft-Lyons scam, which were exacerbated and enlarged in Twain's mind.

Depending on the reader's stamina, it can or can not be skipped. It is worthwhile certainly for the state of Clemens's mind near the end. I suppose this is the equivalent of a hidden manuscript discovered after a century, but its existence was known and protected by the author's wishes. An invaluable contribution to Twain studies and probably will lead to a number of new biographies correcting and enlarging the record here.

Autobiography mark twain volume 3: The surprising final chapter of

If you have read volumes 1 and 2, this is required reading. A last half decade well spent getting these honest thoughts on paper. And yes, he hates Teddy Roosevelt like some of us hate autobiography mark twain volume 3 recent Presidents. Hank Pharis. Literary historians are certainly indebted to those who made these volumes available. I was amazed in this volume by how much Twain did not like Theodore Roosevelt.

Actually he says he liked him as a person but hated his politics. I could not help but wonder if Twain resented TR being the only man in America with a bigger personality than him and who was even more loved than him. Perhaps the most interesting thing in all three volumes is the end of this book. Twain had a Secretary and Financial Manager whom the totally trusted.

There are a couple of books and a movie that suggest that Twain had an affair with his Secretary. But these came out before this autobiography. When all of this controversy was going on Twain wrote an extended account of everything that happened which was again not to be published until long after all of those involved were dead. Twain's case seems compelling that the villans were his employees.

Furthermore it seems doubtful from all that he says that he ever had an "affair" with the Secretary. Todd Stockslager. Review title: Goodbye, old friend With this third massive volume, the "Complete and Authoritative Edition" of Twain's autobiographical writings is complete. You can read my reviews of Volume 1 and Volume 2 to learn more about the best autobiography never written.

The same praise applies here, as Twain brings his writings to a close within six months of his death in April This volume showcases three aspects of Twain's mind: 1. His political concerns We have already encountered Twain's well-documented deep dislike and distain of Teddy Roosevelt in the first two volumes. But reading this venom expressed in exactly the same tone and language directed against President Trump in his first year is both powerfully prophetic and cautionary.

One example of several: Hasn't he kept up such a continual thundering from our Olympus about foot-ball and base ball. And so on, and so on--the list of unpresidential things, things hitherto deemed impossible, wholly impossible, measurelessly impossible for a president of the United States to do--is much too long for invoicing here. Trump is a similarly larger than life personality and lightning rod for both intense support and distain.

How will history record Trump's legacy a century from now? Before you answer, apply study, thought and wisdom, and consider Twain's words here: The bulk of any nation's opinions about its president, or its king, or its emperor, or its politics, or its religion, is without value, and not worth weighing or considering or examining. There is nothing mental in it; it is all feeling, and procured at second-hand without any assistance from the proprietor's reasoning powers.

I know my position is not popular, and not likely to be adopted and enacted into policy, but when I see the news dominated by the same defects Twain documented over a century ago, I am convinced that American democracy is in need of such a radical change. His personal tragedies Twain is usually remembered as the colloquial storyteller, witty speaker, and avuncular grandpa we all wish we had.

But his personal life and personality was shaped by tragedy. We have already read in the earlier volumes of the death of his beloved wife and of his daughter Suzy while Twain and his wife were crossing the ocean from Europe to try to reach her bedside but tragically too late. In this volume we learn of the sudden death of his best friend H.

And then, just months after that and months after Twain's daughter Jean had returned home to live with Twain after spending most of her recent years under institional care and experimental cures far from home for her life long diagnosis of epilepsy, she died suddenly at home after a seizure. This last tragedy, on Christmas Eveshook him to the core.

He concluded his dictation with a page outpouring of the most intensely personal, deep, and sad writing you will ever read. It begins: " Jean is dead! And so this Autobiography closes here. I had a reason for projecting it, three years ago: that reason perishes with her. He would leave us as not just humorous, witty, and avuncular, but deeply human.

It is why we still read him and he still speaks to us. His surprising final manuscript The bulk of the three volumes are transcripts of dictation sessions, initially daily but by the last year of his life often separated by week-long gaps. But appended to the end of the dictations is a plus page manuscript written by Twain and lost for decades until first studied in the s and used as the basis for narratives of the last year's of Twain's life that started appearing in the last decade.

Known as the Ashcroft-Lyon Manuscript, it is published here in its entirety for the first time, from Twain's handwritten original. The manuscript is Twain's view of his seven-year relationship with Isabel Lyon, first his wife's and then his personal secretary, and Ralph Ashcroft, his business manager, who later married Lyon. Lyon became an integral part of the Clemens household, and Ashcroft was a trusted business advisor and friend who worked for and accompanied Twain on travels without compensation for much of their relationship.

However, at the instigation of Twain's daughter Clara and his close friend H. Rogers, Twain began to suspect the pair of working behind the scene to divide the family and defraud him out of thousands of dollars. The manuscript tells Twain's side of first his uncritical belief in the integrity and loyalty of Ashcroft and Lyon, and then his astonished and angry discovery of the truth of the suspicions when he hired an accountant and a lawyer to investigate.

Combined with the final personal tragedy Twain would soon suffer, this manuscript reveals the full range of anger and sadness a man could suffer, and this man puts it on paper like few other writers ever have.

Autobiography mark twain volume 3: This third and final

Twain was in the end fully human. Goodbye, old friend. A fascinating and often hilarious series of anecdotes and observations The third volume of Twain's autobiography continues in its unorthodox style as less a narrative of his life than a series of random asides that he decided to dictate between and The almost cynical way Twain decided to "write" is autobiography is continuously amusing.

Ultimately it was a scheme to extend the copyright on his written works so he'd as the copyright was about to expire, he'd append 20, or so words of "autobiography" to the book and therefore extend the copyright another 24 years. It was so blindingly cynical as to be commendable.

Autobiography mark twain volume 3: First edition. - Hardcover -

The combincaiton of irascibility, self-deprecation, and egotism prevails throughout this work as Twain rails against everything from banquet speeches hates themhonorary degrees loves them because he didn't do anything to earn itand his own laziness unsurpassed in his eye. This book is like sitting at the feet of a crotchety old man who keep hitting you with " Example: "Mr.

Roosevelt is the most formidable disaster that has befallen the country since the Civil War -- but the vast mass of the nation loves him, is frantically fond of him, even idolizes him. This is the simple truth. It sounds like a libel upon the intelligence of the autobiography mark twain volume 3 race, but it isn't; there isn't anyway to libel the intelligence of the human race.

His reminiscences after that point are heartbreaking as he recounts all the little things throughout the house that, now without an agent behind them, feel so empty. It's quite moving and an understandable, if sad, way to end the work. Tom Schulte. This compendium of autobiographical material, like the other volumes available freely for online readingis an entertaining and in insightful view into the wit and world of the great American humorist.

For me, this concluding volume I don't know that more are planned by O of C Pressis in two parts. The second half is a saddening look into the twilight of his life: he the The Autobiography was wasted and had to defend himself from a married servant couple from drinking, theft of property and wealth, and the cruel confinement of his epileptic daughter Jean Clemens beyond what was humane.

The long poem for his daughter Olivia and his parting thoughts on his daughter Jean are each worth the price of this volume. Clemens was it is unbeatable, better and more interesting than any other of the myriad biographies of the great man. In this final volume however, as well as the pieces on everything from his trip to England to receive an honorary doctorate from Oxford to his loathing of Teddy Roosevelt, to the death of his youngest daughter, that make up the autobiography proper, there is a long piece; The Ashcroft-Lyon manuscript, that is a vicious, cruel, libellous and more than slightly mad account of the alleged swindling of him by both his secretary and business manager.

His innovative notion, to "talk only about the thing which interests you for the moment", meant that his thoughts could range freely. The strict instruction that many of these texts remain unpublished for years meant that when they came out, he would be "dead, and unaware, and indifferent," and that he was therefore free to speak his "whole frank mind.

In celebration of this important milestone this is Mark Twain's uncensored autobiography in its entirety and exactly as he left it. It is told over three volumes and presents Mark Twain's authentic and unsuppressed voice, brimming with humor, ideas, and opinions, and speaking clearly from the grave as he intended. Like its companion volumes, it chronicles Twain's inner and outer life through a series of daily dictations that go wherever his fancy leads.

Created from March to Decemberthese dictations present Mark Twain at the end of his life: receiving an honorary degree from Oxford University; railing against Theodore Roosevelt; founding numerous clubs; incredulous at an exhibition of the Holy Grail; credulous about the authorship of Shakespeare's plays; relaxing in Bermuda; observing and investing in new technologies.

Clemens, a brief chronology ; Family biographies ; Speech at the seventieth birthday dinner, 5 December ; Speech at the Players, 3 January ; Previous publication -- v. Clemens, a brief chronology ; Family biographies ; Previous publication -- v.