Getting to be Mark Twain

Mark Twain is one of our most accessible cultural icons, a figure familiar to virtually every American and renowned internationally. But he was not always as we know him today. Mark Twain began life as a loose gathering of postures, attitudes, and voices in the mind of Samuel Clemens. It was some time before he took full possession of the personality the world now recognizes.

This is the story of the coming of age of Mark Twain. It begins in 1867, with Clemens stepping off the steamship Qua...