"Mark Twain"

(noun)

The pen name of Samuel Clemens, a great and influential American author and humorist. His most famous works include The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876), and its sequel, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885), the latter often being called "the Great American Novel. "

Related Terms

Examples of "Mark Twain" in the following topics:

  • Samuel Clemens, a.k.a. "Mark Twain"

    • Mark Twain helped to create and popularize a distinctive American literature built upon American themes and language.
    • Samuel Langhorne Clemens, better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American author and humorist .
    • Twain achieved great success as a writer and public speaker.
    • Thus, the collection of Twain's works is an ongoing process.
    • The work recounts Twain's memories and new experiences after a 22-year absence from the Mississippi, and explains that "Mark Twain" was the call made when a boat was in safe water – two fathoms (12 ft/3.7 m).

  • The Rise of Realism

    • Realist writers included Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain), Stephen Crane, William Dean Howells, and Horatio Alger Jr.
    • Samuel Clemens (1835–1910), better known by his pen name of "Mark Twain," grew up in the Mississippi River frontier town of Hannibal, Missouri.
    • Twain's style, however, was based on vigorous, realistic, colloquial American speech, and gave American writers a new appreciation of their national voice.
    • Twain was the first major author to come from the interior of the country, and he captured its distinctive, humorous slang and tendency toward iconoclasm.
    • Twain is best known for his works Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the latter of which combined rich humor, a sturdy narrative, and social criticism.

  • Defining Credibility

    • Mark Twain once said that an expert is just "an ordinary fellow from another town. " If only it were that easy!

  • Research Tips: Start Early, Use a Bibliography, and Evaluate Material Critically

    • Mark Twain once said, "It usually takes me more than three weeks to prepare a good impromptu speech. " If it took that long for Mark Twain, one of the most eloquent speakers in American history, to write a "good impromptu speech," students of public speaking should take note and get a nice, early start on the research process.

  • The Philippine-American War

    • Some Americans, notably William Jennings Bryan, Mark Twain, Andrew Carnegie, Ernest Crosby, and other members of the American Anti-Imperialist League, strongly objected to the annexation of the Philippines.

  • Conclusion: Trends of the Gilded Age

    • The term for this period came into use in the 1920s and 1930s and was derived from writer Mark Twain's 1873 work, The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today, which satirized an era of serious social problems masked by a thin gold gilding.
    • A book cover of The Gilded Age by Mark Twain (1st edition, 1873).

  • Territorial Government

    • As Mark Twain wrote in 1913 while working for his brother, the secretary of Nevada, "The government of my country snubs honest simplicity, but fondles artistic villainy, and I think I might have developed into a very capable pickpocket if I had remained in the public service a year or two."
    • Then surveyors would create detailed maps marking the land into squares of six miles on each side, subdivided first into one-square-mile blocks, and then into 160-acre lots.

  • Power

    • . ~ Mark Twain

  • Courtesy

    • "I can live for two months on a good compliment," Mark Twain claimed.
    • To quote Twain again, "Always do right.

  • The Gilded Age

    • This term was coined by Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner in their book The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today, published in 1873.
    • Many critics complained that the era was marked by ostentatious display, crass manners, corruption, and shoddy ethics.
    • Socially, the period was marked by large-scale immigration from Germany and Scandinavia to the industrial centers and to western farmlands, the deepening of religious organizations, the rapid growth of high schools, and the emergence of a managerial and professional middle class.
    • The end of the Gilded Age coincided with the Panic of 1893, a deep depression, which lasted until 1897 and marked a major political realignment in the election of 1896.