Mark Twain's Literary Resources: A Reconstruction of His Library and Reading (Volume Two)

by Alan Gribben

Overview

Dr. Alan Gribben, a foremost Twain scholar, made waves in 1980 with the publication of Mark Twain's Library, a study that exposed for the first time the breadth of Twain's reading and influences. Prior to Gribben's work, much of Twain's reading history was assumed lost, but through dogged searching Gribben was able to source much of Twain's library. Mark Twain's Literary Resources is a much-expanded examination of Twain's library and readings. Volume I included Gribben's reflections on the work involved in cataloging Twain's reading and analysis of Twain's influences and opinions. This volume, long awaited, is an in-depth and comprehensive accounting of Twain's literary history. Each work read or owned by Twain is listed, along with information pertaining to editions, locations, and more. Gribben also includes scholarly annotations that explain the significance of many works, making this volume of Mark Twain's Literary Resources one of the most important additions to our understanding of America's greatest author.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781588383952
Publisher:	University of Georgia Press
Publication date:	06/14/2022
Pages:	1125
Product dimensions:	7.00(w) x 10.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Fifty years of research and travel resulted in ALAN GRIBBEN’s two-volume Mark Twain’s Literary Resources: A Reconstruction of His Library and Reading. Gribben was the editor of the Mark Twain Journal: The Author and His Era and for fifteen years he reviewed books and articles about Mark Twain for American Literary Scholarship, An Annual. His NewSouth editions of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn offered altered versions of the texts, which omitted racial slurs. He also coedited Mark Twain on the Move: A Travel Reader. Gribben’s Harry Huntt Ransom: Intellect in Motion was the first biography about the eminent library founder at the University of Texas at Austin. Forty-five years as an English professor concluded with Gribben’s retirement from the classroom in 2019.

DR. ALAN GRIBBEN co-founded the Mark Twain Circle of America, compiled Mark Twain’s Library: A Reconstruction, and recently co-edited Mark Twain on the Move: A Travel Reader. Gribben has written numerous essays about Mark Twain’s life and image. He teaches on the English faculty of Auburn University at Montgomery and edits the Mark Twain Journal.

Table of Contents

Foreword ix

Preface xi

Acknowledgments xvii

Introduction xx

1 William Dean Howells's "Most Unliterary" Author: Mark Twain 3

2 Friends Like These: Lavishing Faint Praise on Mark Twain 17

3 Samuel L. Clemens's Earliest Literary Experiences 24

4 Samuel L. Clemens's Eclectic Reading: His Favorite Books 31

5 Reading Mark Twain Reading 49

6 The Formation of Samuel L. Clemens's Library 55

7 The Dispersal of Samuel L. Clemens's Library Books 67

8 'Good Books & a Sleepy Conscience': Mark Twain's Reading Habits 79

9 'I Kind of Love Small Game': Mark Twain's Library of Literary Hogwash 90

10 Susy Clemens's Shakespeare 109

11 'It Is Unsatisfactory to Read to One's Self: Mark Twain's Informal Readings 116

12 'A Splendor of Stars & Suns': Mark Twain as a Reader of Browning's Poems 124

13 How Tom Sawyer Played Robin Hood 'By the Book' 135

14 Mark Twain, Phrenology, and the 'Temperaments': A Study of Pseudoscientific Influence 139

15 Tom Sawyer, Tom Canty, and Huckleberry Finn: The Boy Book and Mark Twain 160

16 Manipulating a Genre: Huckleberry Finn as Boy Book 175

17 If I'd a Knowed What a Trouble It "Was to Quote a Book: Literary Knowledge in Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn 182

18 Mark Twain Reads Longstreet's Georgia Scenes 187

19 'That Pair of Spiritual Derelicts': The Poe- Twain Relationship 192

20 Those Other Thematic Patterns in Mark Twain's Writings 200

21 "The Master Hand of Old Malory': Mark Twain's Acquaintance with Le Morte D'Arthur 215

22 Anatole France and Mark Twain's Satan 223

23 'I Detest Novels, Poetry & Theology': Origin of a Fiction Concerning Mark Twain's Reading 225

24 'Stolen from Books, Tho' Credit Given': Mark Twain's Use of Literary Sources 230

25 The Unfortunate Fate of the Clemenses' Library Collection 238

26 Critical Bibliography: Books, Articles, Doctoral Dissertations, and Master's Theses Related to Samuel L. Clemens's Reading 246

Index 275

Preface

"Perhaps more than any other published study of Mark Twain, Mark Twain's Literary Resources: A Reconstruction of His Library and Reading probes deeply into his mind and life experiences, providing information essential to what he knew and how he knew it, where he got his ideas, and how his mind worked. Dr. Alan Gribben has done all this by attempting something not only that no one else has ever done for Mark Twain but also something never done for any author. Considering that the books, magazines, newspapers, and other publications Gribben discusses within these pages number in the thousands, to call his reference work 'monumental' is almost an understatement." — R. Kent Rasmussen, from his foreword

Editorial Reviews

Mark Twain’s Literary Resources is a model of disciplined and lively literary scholarship. While much of author Alan Gribben’s work is the bedrock business of fact-collecting, the delights come from his many ways of exploring for his readers what Twain’s collected reading means in understanding the classic American author as a man, a creative force, and as both an appreciator and detractor of the writings of others. An astonishing and captivating achievement.

The Washington Independent Review of Books

Alan Gribben is a scholar's scholar, and Mark Twain's Literary Resources is his masterwork. It will retain its fertile usefulness so long as Twain studies exist. Volume One and Two, both now available, aren't just a bounteous treasure of information and an important corrective to the most common misperception of Twain. They are also an engaging record of Gribben's tireless, lifelong adventure in literary sleuthing.

Frederick Crews

Mark Twain’s Literary Resources lets readers cozy up to Mark Twain and peep over his shoulder as he reads: a rare and rewarding vantage point.

author of Mark Twain: A Brief Critical Biography and George Washington: A Life in Books - Kevin J. Hayes

Dr. Alan Gribben’s Mark Twain’s Literary Resources offers a fascinating peek into the mind of an American literary genius. The book’s mind-boggling wealth of information could only have been gathered using extraordinary research skills and dogged determination. The work is an invaluable tool for Mark Twain scholars and sets a new standard for generations of scholars to come.

Laura Skandera Trombley

From the day I discovered Alan Gribben’s Mark Twain’s Library: A Reconstruction, it became one of only two reference works that I have kept within arm’s reach of my desk. Gribben’s research served as an inspiration and guidepost enabling me to make my own discoveries. His new updated and expanded Mark Twain’s Literary Resources has been one of my most eagerly anticipated publications throughout the years. With hundreds of new entries, it is the most extensive mapping of Mark Twain’s intellectual development that will ever be undertaken. It is an essential reference work for any Mark Twain researcher or biographer.

Barbara Schmidt

Alan Gribben’s Mark Twain’s Literary Resources brings together in two volumes a series of interconnected essays, many revisions of his earlier published works, and a significant update of annotated titles in Twain’s personal library. This new edition replaces the invaluable Mark Twain’s Library: A Reconstruction — long out of print and nearly impossible to obtain. The introductory essays in the first volume render in toto a penetrating critique of the reader behind the writer who, as Ernest Hemingway once said, reinvented American literature.

author of Mark Twain: The Adventures of Samuel L. Clemens - Jerome Loving

Through many years of research and many miles on the road carrying out his literary detective work, Alan Gribben has achieved in the two volumes of Mark Twain’s Literary Resources a reference work that will not be surpassed in its usefulness, comprehensiveness, value, and importance. It is truly a monumental achievement, easily worthy of that word. It instantly becomes an essential reference tool for anyone interested in Mark Twain, both for individuals and for libraries. Just as Mark Twain was inexhaustible in his reading, Gribben has been inexhaustible in his research, and generations of scholars and enthusiasts will be the beneficiaries as a result.

The Mark Twain Annual - John Bird

Mark Twain’s Literary Resources is the definitive guide to Mark Twain’s intellectual universe. Alan Gribben discusses everything from the elaborately bound parlor-table gift books known by titles such as Friendship’s Offering to the literary, historical, and religious works that directly influenced America’s greatest writer. This book, the most useful reference book on Twain ever written, is a classic. And despite what Twain said about classics, this one will be read again and again.

author of five books on Mark Twain, including Mark Twain Under Fire: Reception and Reputation, Criticism and Controv - Joe B. Fulton

Alan Gribben has devoted decades to cataloging and studying this legendary author's lifetime of reading. His Mark Twain's Literary Resources is the magnificent result. It complements Twain’s autobiography and biographies of Twain, and will enhance any reference library.

author of The Woman Warrior and other novels - Maxine Hong Kingston

One of the foundational sources of Mark Twain studies for nearly forty years, Alan Gribben’s Mark Twain’s Library: A Reconstruction has long been a scholarly treasure. Gribben's revised and much expanded compendium, Mark Twain’s Literary Resources Vol I and Vol II, will prove to be the standard reference guide on the topic for the next many decades. These volumes belong in all research libraries and on the shelves of all nineteenth-century Americanists.

Gary Scharnhorst

Mark Twain knew that you can’t write if you don’t read, and his reading was as wide and deep as his beloved Mississippi River, flowing through his life and writings from beginning to end. It is in large measure thanks to Alan Gribben’s Mark Twain’s Literary Resources that we understand how Twain’s extensive reading nourished his authorial genius. Gribben’s achievement is no mere library catalog, but rather a voyage of discovery that expertly navigates the complex channels of Twain’s literary sources. They are all charted here, awaiting further exploration, beckoning both the avid reader and serious scholar, and often as entertaining as Twain’s own published writings. Here is a masterpiece of research and presentation that will serve as a model for all future enquiries into the wellsprings of the creative process.

Kevin Mac Donnell

Alan Gribben’s critical masterpiece, Mark Twain’s Literary Resources Vol I and Vol II, asserts itself as one of a handful of truly invaluable resources in Mark Twain studies. A heroic compendium of analytical essays, annotated catalogs, critical bibliographies, and index guides, this work is the definitive study of the literary, philosophical, historical, and scientific texts that shaped Mark Twain’s mind and art.

coauthor of Heretical Fictions: Religion in the Literature of Mark Twain - Joseph Csicsila

Mark Twain’s Literary Resources lets readers cozy up to Mark Twain and peep over his shoulder as he reads: a rare and rewarding vantage point. — Kevin J. Hayes, author of Mark Twain, a brief critical biography

From the Publisher