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Brief biography of Mark Twain, an outstanding American writer. Mark Twain - biography, information, personal life Year of birth of Mark Twain

Mark Twain (real name Samuel Langhorne Clemens) is an American writer, journalist and public figure- was born November 30, 1835 in Florida (Missouri, USA).

He was the third of four surviving children (there were seven in all) of John Marshall Clemens (August 11, 1798 - March 24, 1847) and Jane Lampton (1803-1890). The family was of Cornish, English and Scotch-Irish ancestry. The father, being a native of Virginia, was named after Chief Justice of the United States John Marshall. The parents met when John moved to Missouri and married on May 6, 1823 at Columbia in Kentucky.

In total, John and Jane had seven children, of whom only four survived: Samuel himself, his brothers Orion (July 17, 1825 - December 11, 1897) and Henry (1838-1858), and sister Pamela (1827-1904). When Samuel was 4 years old, the family was looking for a better life moved to the city of Hannibal (in the same place, in Missouri). It was this city and its inhabitants that were later described by Mark Twain in his famous works, especially in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer ( 1876 ).

Clemens' father died in 1847 of pneumonia, leaving many debts. The eldest son, Orion, soon began publishing a newspaper, and Sam began to contribute as much as he could as a typesetter and occasionally as a writer. Some of the newspaper's liveliest and most controversial articles came from the pen of his younger brother, usually when Orion was away. Sam himself also occasionally traveled to St. Louis and New York.

Clemens began to work as a pilot on a steamer. It was a profession that, according to Clemens himself, he would have been doing all his life if the civil war had not put an end to private shipping. in 1861. So Clemens was forced to look for another job.

After a short acquaintance with the people's militia (this experience he vividly described in 1885), Clemens in July 1861 left the war to the west. Then his brother Orion was offered the position of secretary to the governor of the Nevada Territory. Sam and Orion traveled across the prairies in a stagecoach for two weeks to a Virginia mining town where silver was mined in Nevada.

The experience of living in the Western United States shaped Twain as a writer and formed the basis of his second book. In Nevada, hoping to get rich, Sam Clemens became a miner and began mining silver. He had to live for a long time in the camp with other prospectors - this way of life he later described in literature. But Clemens could not become a successful prospector, he had to leave silver mining and get a job at the Territorial Enterprise newspaper in the same place in Virginia. In this newspaper, he first used the pseudonym "Mark Twain".

In 1864 he moved to San Francisco, where he began to write for several newspapers at the same time. In 1865 Twain had his first literary success, his humorous story"The Famous Jumping Frog of Calaveras" was reprinted nationwide and titled " the best work humorous literature created in America up to this point.

Spring 1866 Twain was sent by the Sacramento Union newspaper to Hawaii. During the journey, he had to write letters about his adventures. Upon their return to San Francisco, these letters were a resounding success. Colonel John McComb, publisher of the Alta California newspaper, suggested that Twain go on a tour of the state, giving exciting lectures. The lectures immediately became wildly popular, and Twain traveled all over the state, entertaining the audience and collecting a dollar from each listener.

Twain's first success as a writer was on another journey. In 1867 he begged Colonel McComb to sponsor his trip to Europe and the Middle East. In June, as a correspondent for the Alta California and the New York Tribune, Twain traveled to Europe on the steamer Quaker City. In August he also visited Odessa, Yalta and Sevastopol (in the "Odessa Bulletin" dated August 24, 1867, the "Address" of American tourists written by Twain is placed). As part of the ship's delegation, Mark Twain visited the residence of the Russian emperor in Livadia.

Letters written by Twain during his travels in Europe and Asia were sent to his editor and published in the newspaper, and later formed the basis of the book "Simples Abroad". The book is out in 1869, distributed by subscription and was a huge success. Until the very end of his life, many knew Twain precisely as the author of "Simples Abroad". For my writing career Twain had a chance to travel to Europe, Asia, Africa and Australia.

In 1870, at the peak of success from "Simples Abroad", Twain married Olivia Langdon and moved to Buffalo, New York. From there he moved to the city of Hartford (Connecticut). During this period, he lectured frequently in the United States and England. Then he began to write sharp satire, sharply criticizing American society and politicians, this is especially noticeable in the collection Life on the Mississippi, written by in 1883.

One of Mark Twain's inspirations was John Ross Brown's note-taking style.

Twain's greatest contribution to the American and world literature considered the novel "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn". Also very popular are The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, The Prince and the Pauper, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, and the collection autobiographical stories"Life on the Mississippi". Mark Twain began his career with unpretentious humorous couplets, and ended with sketches of human manners full of subtle irony, sharply satirical pamphlets on socio-political topics, and philosophically deep and, at the same time, very pessimistic reflections on the fate of civilization.

Many public speeches and lectures have been lost or not recorded, individual works and the letters were banned from publication by the author himself during his lifetime and for decades after his death.

Twain was an excellent orator. Having received recognition and fame, Mark Twain spent a lot of time searching for young literary talents and helping them to break through, using his influence and the publishing company he acquired.

Twain was fond of science and scientific problems. He was very friendly with Nikola Tesla, they spent a lot of time together in Tesla's laboratory. In his work A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, Twain introduced time travel, which resulted in many modern technologies appeared in England during the time of King Arthur. Technical details, given in the novel, testify to Twain's good acquaintance with the achievements of contemporary science.

Two of Mark Twain's other most famous hobbies were playing billiards and smoking. Visitors to Twain's house sometimes said that there was such thick tobacco smoke in the writer's office that it was almost impossible to see the owner himself.

Twain was a prominent figure in the American Anti-Imperial League which protested the American annexation of the Philippines. In response to these events, in which about 600 people died, Twain wrote the pamphlet "The Incident in the Philippines", but the work was published only in 1924 , 14 years after his death.

From time to time, some of Twain's works were banned by American censors for various reasons. This was mainly due to the active civic and social position of the writer. Some works that might offend religious feelings people, Twain did not print at the request of his family. So, for example, "The Mysterious Stranger" remained unpublished before 1916. One of Twain's most controversial works was a humorous lecture at a Parisian club, published under the title Reflections on the Science of Onanism. The essay was only published in 1943 limited edition of 50 copies. Several more anti-religious works remained unpublished until the 1940s.

Twain himself treated censorship with irony. When in 1885 public library in Massachusetts decided to withdraw The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn from the fund, Twain wrote to his publisher:

"They've taken Huck out of the library as 'slum-only trash' because of that we'll no doubt sell another 25,000 copies."

In the 2000s In the United States, attempts were again made to ban The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn because of naturalistic descriptions and verbal expressions offensive to blacks. Although Twain was an opponent of racism and imperialism and went much further than his contemporaries in his rejection of racism, many of the words that were in common use during the time of Mark Twain and used by him in the novel do indeed sound like racial slurs now. February 2011в США вышло первое издание книг Марка Твена «Приключения Гекльберри Финна» и «Приключения Тома Сойера», в котором подобные слова и выражения заменены на политкорректные (например, слово «nigger» (негр) заменено по тексту на «slave» (раб)) .

Before his death, the writer survived the loss of three of his four children, and his wife Olivia also died. In their later years Twain was in deep depression but could still joke. In response to an erroneous obituary in the New York Journal, he delivered his famous phrase: Rumors of my death are somewhat exaggerated. Twain's financial situation was also shaken: his publishing company went bankrupt; he invested a lot of money in new model a printing press that was never put into production; plagiarists stole the rights to several of his books.

In 1893 Twain was introduced to oil tycoon Henry Rogers, one of the directors of the Standard Oil Company. Rogers helped Twain to profitably reorganize his financial affairs, and the two became close friends. Twain often visited Rogers, they drank and played poker. We can say that Twain even became a family member for the Rogers. Sudden death of Rogers 1909 deeply shocked Twain.

Samuel Clemens, known worldwide as Mark Twain, has died April 21, 1910, at the age of 75, from angina pectoris (angina pectoris). A year before his death, he said: "I came in 1835 with Halley's Comet, a year later it arrives again, and I expect to leave with it." And so it happened.

The writer was buried at Woodlawn Cemetery in Elmira, New York.

Artworks:
"The Famous Jumping Frog of Calaveras", a collection of short stories ( 1867 )
"The Story of Mamie Grant, Missionary Girl" ( 1868 )
"Simples Abroad, or the Way of New Pilgrims" ( 1869 )
"Tempered" ( 1871 )
"Gilded Age" ( 1873 ), the novel was written jointly with Ch.D. Warner
"Old and New Essays" ( 1875 ), storybook
"Old Times on the Mississippi" ( 1875 )
"Adventures of Tom Sawyer" ( 1876 )
"Prince and the Pauper" ( 1881 )
"Life on the Mississippi" ( 1883 )
"The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" 1884 )
"Knights of Labor - a new dynasty" ( 1886 )
"Letter from a Guardian Angel" 1887 ), published in 1946
"A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court" 1889 )
"Adam's Diary" 1893 )
"Coot Wilson" ( 1894 )
"Personal reminiscences of Joan of Arc by Sieur Louis de Comte, her page and secretary" ( 1896 )
"School Hill", remained unfinished ( 1898 )
"The Man Who Corrupted Hadleyburg" ( 1900 )
"Deal with Satan" 1904 )
"Eve's Diary" 1905 )
"Three Thousand Years Among the Microbes (The Life of the Microbe, with Notes by the Same Hand Seven Thousand Years Later). Translated from microbial by Mark Twain. 1905" ( 1905 )
"Letters from the Earth" ( 1909 )
"No. 44, The Mysterious Stranger. An old manuscript found in a jar. Free translation from a jug”, remained unfinished ( 1902-1908 )

The article is devoted to a brief biography of Mark Twain, a writer from the USA, who became famous primarily for his works about Tom Sawyer.

Biography of Twain: becoming a writer

Mark Twain (S. Clemens) was born in 1835 in a small village in Florida. Soon the family moved to the city of Hannibal, which is associated with childhood memories of Twain, reflected in the image hometown T. Sawyer. Since childhood future writer was a frequent visitor to the library. In 1859, after training, he worked for some time as a pilot on the Mississippi.
In 1861 Twain moved to Nevada. For some time he worked in the silver mines. Having placed several articles in one of the newspapers, the future writer was invited to the position of a permanent employee. Twain's publications were originally like works of art. In them he humorously described ordinary life American province.
From 1864 the writer lived in San Francisco, where he also worked as a correspondent. In 1872, Twain published an autobiographical book, The Hardened, and after a while, a collection of short stories. In 1875, a book was published that glorified the writer around the world - "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer". The wild popularity of the work prompted Twain to publish The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. The writer, on the wave of success, tried to write a continuation of the story about the two main characters, but these works were no longer very successful.
The Adventures of Two Boys is not only an exciting read for children, full of humorous incidents and dangers. In the adventures of H. Finn, Twain masterfully depicts the life of an ordinary American province with its measured life, with its joys and disappointments. The image of the fugitive Negro Jim, personifying the whole viciousness of the slave system, is extremely important. The author does not speak directly against slavery, but does so through the feelings and experiences of the boy. Huck's journey with Jim puts them on equal footing. The reader sees that the runaway slave is a human being, treating Huck even better than "normal" white people. Twain introduced the use of Negro words into American literature. dialect words and expressions, proving that they are an inseparable part of US culture.
At the turn of the 80s. Twain becomes one of the most famous realist writers in America, his work is considered the personification of all American life.
Twain was interested medieval history. In this area he wrote fantasy novel"A Yankee in King Arthur's Court".

Biography of Twain: mature years

In 1884 he was able to establish his own publishing house. In the 90s. the writer begins to work in the genre of acute social satire, his works and satirical pamphlets are directed against almost all American public institutions. Mark Twain thoroughly knew and loved the patriarchal life of the American hinterland. He considered the life and work of a simple American person to be the only correct and true. The turbulent events of the turn of the century showed that a new social system was coming with its own laws and orders.
Twain's early humorous stories asserted the power of man - the conqueror of America. The heroes of the stories were the bearers of the "American dream", according to which any person, with equal starting opportunities, is able to achieve everything in life that he wants. Gradually, the writer is faced with the harsh reality of the new bourgeois century. Along with the former humor, the bitterness of unfulfilled hopes sounds in his works. The expression of these moods of the writer was the story "Coot Wilson", in which he portrayed the failure of traditional American life. Twain was disappointed with the development of American democracy, he admitted that his former beliefs and ideals turned out to be just dreams.
In the early 90s. Mark Twain's publishing firm suffered a financial collapse. In order to improve his financial situation, the writer made trip around the world accompanied by public lectures.
The writer died in 1910 in Connecticut. Many famous writers It has been argued that modern American literature was created by Twain. Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn became favorite childhood heroes a large number readers.

Years of life: from 11/30/1835 to 04/21/1910

Outstanding American writer, satirist, journalist and public figure. He is best known for The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

Real name is Samuel Langhorne Clemens.

early years

Born in the small town of Florida (Missouri, USA) in the family of merchant John Marshall Clemens and Jane Lampton Clemens. He was the sixth child in a family of seven children.

When Mark Twain was 4 years old, his family moved to the town of Hannibal, a river port on the Mississippi River. Subsequently, it is this city that will serve as the prototype of the town of St. Petersburg in famous novels The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. At this time, Missouri was a slave state, therefore already at that time Mark Twain was faced with slavery, which he would later describe and condemn in his works.

In March 1847, when Mark Twain was 11, his father died of pneumonia. IN next year he starts working as an assistant in a printing house. Since 1851, he has been typing and editing articles and humorous essays for the Hannibal Journal, a newspaper owned by his brother Orion.

The Orion newspaper soon closed, the paths of the brothers diverged for many years, only to cross again by the end civil war in Nevada.

At the age of 18, he left Hannibal and worked at a print shop in New York, Philadelphia, St. Louis and other cities. He was self-educated, spending a lot of time in the library, thus gaining as much knowledge as he would have received from a regular school.

At the age of 22, Twain moved to New Orleans. On the way to New Orleans, Mark Twain traveled by steamboat. Then he had a dream to become the captain of the ship. Twain meticulously taught the route of the Mississippi River for two years, until he received a diploma as a ship captain in 1859. Samuel got his younger brother to work with him. But Henry died on June 21, 1858, when the steamer he was working on exploded. Mark Twain believed that he was primarily to blame for the death of his brother and guilt did not leave him throughout his life until his death. However, he continued to work on the river and worked until the Civil War broke out and shipping on the Mississippi ceased. The war forced him to change his profession, although Twain regretted it for the rest of his life.

Samuel Clemens had to become a Confederate soldier. But since he has been accustomed to being free since childhood, in two weeks he deserts from the ranks of the army of the inhabitants of the South and directs his way west, to his brother in Nevada. It was only rumored that silver and gold had been found in the wild prairies of this state. This is where Samuel worked whole year in a silver mine. In parallel with this, he wrote humorous stories for the newspaper "Territorial Enterprise" in Virginia City and in August 1862 received an invitation to become its employee. This is where Samuel Clemens had to look for a pseudonym for himself. Clemens claimed that the pseudonym "Mark Twain" was taken from the terms of river navigation, which was called the minimum depth suitable for the passage of river vessels. This is how the writer Mark Twain appeared in the spaces of America, who in the future managed to win world recognition with his work.

Creation

For several years, Mark Twain wandered from newspaper to newspaper as a reporter and feuilletonist. In addition, he earned extra money by reading his books in public. humorous stories. Twain was an excellent orator. As a correspondent for Alta California, he spent five months on a Mediterranean cruise on the steamer Quaker City, during which he collected material for his first book, Simpletons Abroad. Her appearance in 1869 aroused some interest on the part of the reading public because of the combination of good southern humor and satire, rare for those years. Thus, the literary debut of Mark Twain took place. In addition, in February 1870, he married the sister of his friend Ch. Langdon, whom he met during the cruise - Olivia.

Mark Twain's next successful book, co-authored with Charles Warner, was The Gilded Age. The work, on the one hand, is not very successful, because the styles of the co-authors were seriously different, but on the other hand, it became to the taste of readers so much that the time of the reign of President Grant was dubbed its name.

And in 1876 she saw the world A new book Mark Twain, which not only cemented him as the greatest American writer, but also forever brought his name into the history of world literature. It was the famous "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer". In fact, the writer did not have to invent anything. He remembered his childhood in Hannibal and his life during those years. And now, on the pages of the book, the place of St. Petersburg appeared, in which one can easily distinguish the features of Hannibal, as well as the features of many other small settlements scattered along the banks of the Mississippi. And in Tom Sawyer, you can easily recognize the young Samuel Clemens, who really did not like school and was already smoking at the age of 9.

The success of the book exceeded all expectations. A book filled with simple humor and written by in plain language liked by the general public ordinary Americans. Indeed, in Tom, many recognized themselves in a distant and carefree childhood. This recognition of readers Twain secured next book, also not designed for sophisticated minds literary critics. The story "The Prince and the Pauper", which was published in 1882, takes readers to England during the Tudor era. Exciting adventures are combined in this story with a dream common american grow rich. The casual reader liked it.

The historical theme interested the writer. In the preface to his new novel, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, Twain wrote: "If anyone is inclined to condemn our modern civilization Well, you can’t prevent this, but it’s good sometimes to draw a comparison between it and what was done in the world before, and this should calm and inspire hope.”

Before 1884, Mark Twain was already famous writer and also became a successful businessman. He set up a publishing firm nominally headed by C. L. Webster, the husband of his niece. One of the first books published by his own publishing house was his Adventures of Huckleberry Fin. The work, which, according to critics, was the best in the work of Mark Twain, was conceived as a continuation of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. However, it turned out to be much more complex and multi-layered. It was reflected that the writer had been creating it for almost 10 years. And these years were filled constant search the best literary form, the polishing of the language and deep reflection. In this book, Twain, for the first time in American literature, used colloquial American outback. Once it was allowed to be used only in farce and satire on the customs of the common people.

Among other books published by the Mark Twain publishing house can be called "Memoirs" of the eighteenth President of the United States, V.S. Grant. They became a bestseller and brought the desired material well-being to the Samuel Clemens family.

The publishing company of Mark Twain successfully existed until the well-known economic crisis of 1893-1894. The writer's business could not withstand the severe blow and went bankrupt. Back in 1891, Mark Twain was forced to move to Europe in order to save money. From time to time he comes to the United States, trying to improve his financial situation. After the ruin, he does not recognize himself as bankrupt for a long time. In the end, he manages to negotiate with creditors to defer the payment of debts. During this time, Mark Twain wrote several works, among which his most serious historical prose is "Personal Memoirs of Joan of Arc by Sieur Louis de Comte, Her Page and Secretary" (1896), as well as "Coot Wilson" (1894), " Tom Sawyer Abroad (1894) and Tom Sawyer Detective (1896). But none of them could achieve the success that accompanied Twain's previous books.

Later years

The star of the writer inexorably rolled into decline. IN late XIX centuries in the United States begin to publish a collection of works by Mark Twain, thereby elevating him to the category of classics of bygone days. However, the fierce boy who sat inside the elderly, already completely gray-haired, Samuel Clemens did not think to give up. Mark Twain entered the twentieth century with a sharp satire on the mighty of the world this. The writer marked the stormy revolutionary beginning of the century with works designed to expose untruth and injustice: “To a Man Walking in Darkness”, “The United Lynching States”, “The Tsar's Monologue”, “King Leopold's Monologue in defense of his dominance in the Congo”. But in the minds of Americans, Twain remained a classic of "light" literature.

In 1901, he received an honorary Doctor of Letters degree from Yale University. The following year, an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from the University of Missouri. He was very proud of these titles. For a man who had left school at 12, the recognition of his talent by pundits of famous universities flattered him.

In 1906, Twain acquired a personal secretary, who became A. B. Payne. The young man expressed his desire to write a book about the writer's life. However, Mark Twain has already sat down to write his autobiography several times. As a result, the writer begins to dictate the story of his life to Payne. A year later, he was again awarded a degree. He receives an honorary Doctor of Letters degree from the University of Oxford.

At this time, he is already seriously ill, and most of his family members die one after another - he survived the loss of three of his four children, his beloved wife Olivia also died. But even though he was in a deep depression, he could still joke. The writer is tormented by severe attacks of angina pectoris. Ultimately, the heart gives out and on April 24, 1910, at the age of 74, Mark Twain dies.

His last work- the satirical story "The Mysterious Stranger" was published posthumously in 1916 from an unfinished manuscript.

Information about the works:

Mark Twain was born in 1835, the day when Halley's comet flew near the Earth, and died in 1910, the day of its next appearance near the earth's orbit. The writer foresaw his death back in 1909: "I came into this world with Halley's comet, and next year I will leave it with it."

Mark Twain foresaw the death of his brother Henry - he dreamed about it a month before. After this incident, he became interested in parapsychology. He subsequently became a member of the Society for Psychical Research.

At first, Mark Twain signed with another pseudonym - Josh. This signature was followed by notes about the life of miners who flooded into Nevada from all over America when the Silver Rush began there.

Having received recognition and fame, Mark Twain spent a lot of time searching for young literary talents and helping them to break through, using his influence and the publishing company he acquired.

A crater on Mercury is named after Mark Twain.

Bibliography

Screen adaptations of works, theatrical performances

1907 Tom Sawyer
1909 The Prince and the Pauper
1911 Science
1915 The Prince and the Pauper
1917 Tom Sawyer
1918 Huck and Tom
1920 Huckleberry Finn
1920 The Prince and the Pauper
1930 Tom Sawyer
1931 Huckleberry Finn
1936 Tom Sawyer (Kyiv Film Studio)
1937 The Prince and the Pauper
1938 The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
1938 Tom Sawyer, detective
1939 The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
1943 The Prince and the Pauper
1947 Tom Sawyer
1954 Million Pound Bank Note
1968 The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
1972 The Prince and the Pauper
1973 Completely lost
1973 Tom Sawyer
1978 The Prince and the Pauper
1981 The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn
1989 Philip Traum
1993 Hack and the King of Hearts
1994 Eva's Magical Adventure
1994 Million for Juan
1994 Charlie's Ghost: Coronado's Secret
1995 Tom and Huck
2000 Tom Sawyer

Mark Twain, real name Samuel Langhorne Clemens. Born November 30, 1835 in Florida, Missouri, USA - died April 21, 1910 in Redding, Connecticut, USA. American writer, journalist and public figure.

His work covers many genres - humor, satire, philosophical fiction, journalism and others, and in all these genres he invariably takes the position of a humanist and democrat.

William Faulkner wrote that Mark Twain was "the first truly American writer, and since then we have all been his heirs", and Ernest Hemingway believed that all modern American literature came out of one book by Mark Twain, called The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn ". Of the Russian writers, Mark Twain was especially warmly spoken of by and.

Clemens claimed that the pseudonym "Mark Twain" was taken by him in his youth from the terms of river navigation. Then he was a pilot's assistant on the Mississippi, and the cry "mark twain" (English mark twain, literally - "mark deuce") meant that, according to the mark on the lotlin, the minimum depth suitable for the passage of river vessels was reached - 2 fathoms (about 3 .7 m).

However, there is a version about the literary origin of this pseudonym: in 1861, Artemus Ward's humorous story "The North Star" about three sailors, one of whom was named Mark Twain, was published in Vanity Fair magazine. Samuel was very fond of the comic section of this magazine and read Ward's works in his first stand-up performances.

In addition to "Mark Twain", Clemens once in 1896 signed as "Sieur Louis de Comte" (fr. Sieur Louis de Conte) - under this name he published his novel "Personal Memoirs of Joan of Arc by Sieur Louis de Comte, her page and secretary.

Samuel Clemens born November 30, 1835 in a small town in Florida (Missouri, USA). He later joked that by being born, he increased its population by one percent. He was the third of four surviving children of John and Jane Clemens. When Sam was still a child, the family moved to the city of Hannibal (in the same place, in Missouri) in search of a better life. It was this city and its inhabitants that were later described by Mark Twain in his famous works, especially in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876).

Clemens' father died in 1847 of pneumonia, leaving many debts. The eldest son, Orion, soon began publishing a newspaper, and Sam began to contribute as much as he could as a typesetter and occasionally as a writer. Some of the newspaper's liveliest and most controversial articles came from the pen of his little brother, usually when Orion was away. Sam himself also occasionally traveled to St. Louis and New York.

A profession that, according to Clemens himself, he would have practiced all his life if the civil war had not put an end to private shipping in 1861. So Clemens was forced to look for another job.

Twain entered Freemasonry in the lodge " Polar Star» No. 79 in St. Louis on May 22, 1861. During one of his travels, he sent from Palestine to the address of his lodge a “hammer”, to which a letter was enclosed in a humorous spirit. Twain informed his brothers that "The handle of the hammer was carved by Brother Clemens from the trunk of a Lebanese cedar, planted in a timely manner by Brother Goffred of Bouillon near the walls of Jerusalem."

After a short acquaintance with the people's militia (he colorfully described this experience in 1885), Clemens left the war for the west in July 1861. Then his brother Orion was offered the position of secretary to the governor of the Nevada Territory. Sam and Orion traveled across the prairies in a stagecoach for two weeks to a Virginia mining town where silver was mined in Nevada.

But Clemens could not become a successful prospector, he had to leave silver mining and get a job at the Territorial Enterprise newspaper in the same place in Virginia. In this newspaper, he first used the pseudonym "Mark Twain".

In 1864 he moved to San Francisco, where he began to write for several newspapers at the same time.

In 1865, Twain's first literary success came, his humorous story "The Famous Jumping Frog of Calaveras" was reprinted throughout the country and called "the best work of humorous literature created in America to this point."

In the spring of 1866, Twain was sent by the Sacramento Union newspaper to Hawaii. During the journey, he had to write letters about his adventures.

Upon their return to San Francisco, these letters were a resounding success. Colonel John McComb, publisher of the Alta California newspaper, suggested that Twain go on a tour of the state, giving exciting lectures. The lectures immediately became wildly popular, and Twain traveled all over the state, entertaining the audience and collecting a dollar from each listener.

Twain's first success as a writer was on another journey. In 1867, he begged Colonel McComb to sponsor his trip to Europe and the Middle East. In June, as a correspondent for the Alta California and the New York Tribune, Twain traveled to Europe on the steamer Quaker City.. In August, he also visited Odessa, Yalta and Sevastopol (in the "Odessa Bulletin" dated August 24, 1867, the "Address" of American tourists written by Twain is placed). As part of the ship's delegation, Mark Twain visited the residence of the Russian emperor in Livadia.

Letters written by Twain during his travels in Europe and Asia were sent to his editor and published in the newspaper, and later formed the basis of the book. "Simples Abroad". The book was published in 1869, distributed by subscription and was a huge success. Until the very end of his life, many knew Twain precisely as the author of "Simples Abroad". During his writing career, Twain traveled to Europe, Asia, Africa and Australia.

In 1870, at the peak of success from the "Simples Abroad", Twain married Olivia Langdon and moved to Buffalo, New York. From there he moved to the city of Hartford (Connecticut). During this period, he lectured frequently in the United States and England. Then he began to write sharp satire, sharply criticizing American society and politicians, this is especially noticeable in the collection "Life on the Mississippi" written in 1883.

One of Mark Twain's inspirations was John Ross Brown's note-taking style.

Twain's greatest contribution to American and world literature is the novel "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn". Also very popular "Adventures of Tom Sawyer", "Prince and the Pauper", "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court" and a collection of autobiographical stories "Life on the Mississippi".

Mark Twain began his career with unpretentious humorous couplets, and ended with sketches of human manners full of subtle irony, sharply satirical pamphlets on socio-political topics, and philosophically deep and, at the same time, very pessimistic reflections on the fate of civilization.

Many public speeches and lectures were lost or not recorded; individual works and letters were banned from publication by the author himself during his lifetime and for decades after his death.

Twain was fond of science and scientific problems. He was very friendly with, they spent a lot of time together in Tesla's laboratory. In his work A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, Twain introduced time travel that brought many modern technologies to Arthurian England.

The technical details given in the novel testify to Twain's good acquaintance with the achievements of contemporary science.

Two of Mark Twain's other most famous hobbies were playing billiards and smoking pipes. Visitors to Twain's house sometimes said that there was such thick tobacco smoke in the writer's office that it was almost impossible to see the owner himself.

Twain was a prominent figure in the American Anti-Imperial League which protested the American annexation of the Philippines. In response to these events, in which about 600 people died, Twain wrote the pamphlet The Philippines Incident, but the work was not published until 1924, 14 years after his death.

One of Twain's most controversial works was a humorous lecture at a Parisian club, published under the title "Reflections on the Science of Onanism". The central idea of the lecture was: "If you have to risk your life on the sexual front, don't masturbate too much." The essay was published only in 1943 in a limited edition of 50 copies. A few more anti-religious writings remained unpublished until the 1940s.

Twain himself treated censorship with irony. When the Massachusetts Public Library decided to withdraw The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn in 1885, Twain wrote to his publisher: "They've taken Huck out of the library as 'slum-only rubbish', because of that we'll no doubt sell 25,000 more copies.".

In the 2000s, attempts were again made in the United States to ban The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn because of naturalistic descriptions and verbal expressions that were offensive to blacks. Although Twain was an opponent of racism and imperialism and went much further than his contemporaries in his rejection of racism, many of the words that were in common use during the time of Mark Twain and used by him in the novel do indeed sound like racial slurs now.

В феврале 2011 года в США вышло первое издание книг Марка Твена «Приключения Гекльберри Финна» и «Приключения Тома Сойера», в котором подобные слова и выражения заменены на политкорректные (например, слово «nigger» (негр) заменено по тексту на «slave» (slave)).

Until his death in 1910, he suffered the loss of three of his four children, including the death of his wife, Olivia. In his later years, Twain was deeply depressed, but he could still joke.

In response to an erroneous obituary in the New York Journal, he famously said: "Rumors of my death are somewhat exaggerated".

Twain's financial situation was also shaken: his publishing company went bankrupt, he invested a lot of money in a new model of the printing press, which was never put into production. Plagiarists have stolen the rights to several of his books.

In 1893, Twain was introduced to an oil tycoon. Henry Rogers, one of the directors of Standard Oil. Rogers helped Twain to profitably reorganize his financial affairs, and the two became close friends. Twain often visited Rogers, they drank and played poker. We can say that Twain even became a family member for the Rogers.

The sudden death of Rogers in 1909 deeply shocked Twain. Although Mark Twain repeatedly publicly thanked Rogers for saving him from financial ruin, it became clear that their friendship was mutually beneficial. Apparently, Twain significantly influenced the mitigation of the tough temper of the oil magnate, who had the nickname "Cerberus Rogers." After Rogers' death, his papers showed that friendship with famous writer made a real philanthropist and philanthropist out of a ruthless miser. During his friendship with Twain, Rogers began to actively support education, organized educational programs especially for African Americans and talented people with disabilities.

Twain died on April 21, 1910 from angina pectoris. A year before his death, he said: "I came in 1835 with Halley's Comet, a year later it arrives again, and I expect to leave with it." And so it happened.

Twain is buried at Woodlawn Cemetery in Elmira, New York.

In the city of Hannibal, Missouri, the house in which Twain played as a boy, and the caves that he explored as a child and which were later described in the famous Adventures of Tom Sawyer, have been preserved, tourists now come there. Mark Twain's home in Hartford has been turned into his personal museum and declared a National Historic Site in the United States.

A crater on Mercury is named after Twain. The only street in Russia named after Mark Twain is located in Volgograd.

Political Views Mark Twain:

With Mark Twain's views on perfect shape board and political regime can be found by reading his speech "The Knights of Labor - A New Dynasty", which he delivered on March 22, 1886 in the city of Hartford, at a meeting of the Monday Night Club. This speech, titled "The New Dynasty," was first published in September 1957 in the New England Quarterly.

Mark Twain held the position that power should belong to the people and only the people: "The power of one person over others means oppression - invariably and always oppression; let not always conscious, deliberate, deliberate, not always severe, or heavy, or cruel, or indiscriminate - but one way or another - always oppression in one form or another. To whomever you give power, it will certainly manifest itself in oppression.Give power to the Dahomean king - and he will immediately begin to test the accuracy of his brand new rapid-fire rifle on everyone who passes by his palace; people will fall one after another, but not to him or his courtiers and it never enters his head that he does something inappropriate.Give power to the head christian church in Russia - to the emperor - and with one wave of his hand, as if driving away midges, he will send an uncountable multitude of young men, mothers with babies in their arms, gray-haired old men and young girls to the unimaginable hell of his Siberia, and he himself will calmly go to breakfast, without even feeling what barbarism has just been committed. Give power to Constantine or Edward IV, or Peter the Great, or Richard III - I could name a hundred more monarchs - and they will kill their closest relatives, after which they will fall asleep perfectly, even without sleeping pills ... Give power to anyone - and this power will oppress".

The first are few - the king, a handful of other overseers and assistants, and the second are many - these are the peoples of the world: the best representatives of humanity, working people - those who earn bread with their labor. Twain believed that all the rulers that have so far ruled the world sympathized with and patronized the classes and clans of gilded idlers, clever embezzlers of public funds, tireless schemers, troublemakers of public peace, thinking only about their own benefit.

Mark Twain and Religion:

Twain's wife, a deeply religious Protestant (Congregationalist), was never able to "convert" her husband, although he tried to avoid sensitive topics during her lifetime. Many of Twain's novels (for example, "A Yankee in King Arthur's Court") contain extremely harsh attacks on the Catholic Church. IN last years Twain wrote many religious stories that ridicule the Protestant ethic (for example, "Inquisitive Bessie").

It is clear from posthumously published materials that Mark Twain was infinitely far from any existing religious denomination. He summed up his views in 1906 in Reflections on Religion: "Now let's talk about true God, the real God, the great God, the highest and supreme God, the true creator of the real universe ... - a universe not handcrafted for an astronomical nursery, but arose in the boundless expanse of space at the command of the just mentioned true God, a God unimaginably great and majestic, according to in comparison with which all other gods, swarming in myriads in the miserable human imagination, are like a swarm of mosquitoes lost in the infinity of an empty sky ...

As we explore the countless wonders, splendor, brilliance and perfection of this infinite universe (now we know that the universe is infinite) and find that everything in it, from a stalk of grass to the forest giants of California, from an unknown mountain stream to a boundless ocean, from the course of the tides and ebbs to the majestic movement of the planets, unquestioningly obeys a strict system of precise laws that know no exception, we comprehend - we do not assume, we do not conclude, but we comprehend - that the God who with a single thought made this incredible complex world, and with another thought he created the laws that govern him - this God is endowed with unlimited power ...

Do we know that he is just, gracious, kind, meek, merciful, compassionate? No. We have no evidence that he possesses even one of these qualities - and at the same time, every passing day brings us hundreds of thousands of evidence - no, not evidence, but irrefutable evidence - that he does not possess any of them. .

By total absence he has any of those qualities that could adorn a god, inspire respect for him, cause reverence and worship, real god, the true god, the creator of the vast universe, is no different from all the other gods available. Every day he shows quite clearly that he has no interest in either man or other animals - except to torture them, destroy them and extract some entertainment from this activity, while doing everything possible to keep his eternal and unchanging monotony he didn't like it".

Bibliography of Mark Twain:

"The Famous Jumping Frog of Calaveras", a collection of short stories (1867)
"The Story of Mamie Grant, Missionary Girl" (1868)
"Simples Abroad, or the Way of the New Pilgrims" (1869)
"The Hardened" (1871), Russian translation under the title "Light" (1959)
The Gilded Age (1873), novel co-written with C. D. Warner
"Old and New Essays" (1875), collection of short stories
"Old Times on the Mississippi" (1875)
"The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" (1876)
"The Prince and the Pauper" (1881)
"Life on the Mississippi" (1883)
"The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" (1884)
"Knights of Labor - a new dynasty" (1886)
Letter from a Guardian Angel (1887), published 1946
"A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court" (1889)
"Adam's Diary" (1893)
"Coot Wilson" (1894)
"Personal Memoirs of Joan of Arc by Sieur Louis de Comte, Her Page and Secretary" (1896)
"School Hill", left unfinished (1898)
"The Man Who Corrupted Hadleyburg" (1900)
"Deal with Satan" (1904)
"Eve's Diary" (1905)
"Three Thousand Years Among the Microbes (The Life of the Microbe, with Notes by the Same Hand Seven Thousand Years Later). Translated from microbial by Mark Twain. 1905" (1905)
"Letters from the Earth" (1909)
"No. 44, The Mysterious Stranger. An old manuscript found in a jar. Free translation from a jug”, remained unfinished (1902-1908)

>Biographies of writers and poets

Brief biography of Mark Twain

Mark Twain (Samuel Langhorne Clemens) is an outstanding American writer and public figure. Born November 30, 1835 in Florida, Missouri. In his work, Mark Twain used many genres, from satire to philosophical fiction. However, in all these genres, he invariably remained a humanist. At the peak of his career, he was considered perhaps the most prominent American, and his comrades-in-arms spoke of him as the first real writer in the country. Of the Russian writers, Kuprin and Gorky spoke especially warmly of him. Most popular books writer - The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.

Mark Twain was born to John and Jane Clemens in a small town in Missouri. Then the family moved to the city of Hannibal, whose inhabitants he later described in his works. When the father of the family died, the eldest son started publishing a newspaper and Samuel made his unbearable contribution there. With the outbreak of the Civil War, the young man went to work as pilots on a steamer. In July 1861, he moved away from the war to the west, where silver was mined at that time. Not finding himself in the career of a prospector, he again took up journalism. He got a job at a newspaper in Virginia and began to write under the pseudonym Mark Twain.

Writing success came to him in the late 1860s, when, after traveling to Europe, he published the book "Simples Abroad". In 1870 Mark Twain married and moved to Hartford. In the same period, he began to lecture and write satire, criticizing American society. In 1876, a novel about the adventures of a boy named Tom Sawyer was published. The continuation of this novel was The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884). most famous historical novel Mark Twain is The Prince and the Pauper (1881).

In addition to literature, Mark Twain was fascinated by science. He was friendly with Nikola Tesla and often visited his laboratory. In the last years of his life, the writer was in a deep depression: literary success gradually faded away, his financial situation worsened, three of his four children died, and his beloved wife Olivia Langdon also died. Being depressed, he still tried to joke sometimes. Mark Twain died on April 21, 1910 from angina pectoris.

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