One of the greatest American authors, Mark Twain holds a special position not only as a distinctly American cultural icon but also as a preeminent portrayer of youth. His famous writings about children and youthful themes are central to both his work and his popularity.
The distinguished contributors to Mark Twain and Youth make Twain even more accessible to modern readers by fully exploring youth themes in both his life and his extensive writings. The volume's twenty-six original essays offer new perspectives on such important subjects as Twain's boyhood; his relationships with his siblings and his own children; his attitudes toward aging, gender roles, and slavery; the marketing, reception, teaching, and adaptation of his works; and youth themes in his individual novels--Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, The Prince and the Pauper, Pudd'nhead Wilson, and Joan of Arc. The book also includes a revealing foreword by actor Hal Holbrook, who has performed longer as "Mark Twain" than Samuel Clemens himself did.
The book includes contributions by: Lawrence Berkove, John Bird, Jocelyn A. Chadwick, Joseph Csicsila, Hugh H. Davis, Mark Dawidziak, Shelley Fisher Fishkin, James Golden, Alan Gribben, Benjamin Griffin, Ronald Jenn, Holger Kersten, Andrew Levy, Cindy Lovell, Karen Lystra, Debra Ann MacComb, Peter Messent, Linda A. Morris, K. Patrick Ober, John R. Pascal, Lucy E. Rollin, Barbara Schmidt, David E. E. Sloane, Henry Sweets, Wendelinus Wurth.
The 26 essays in this well-edited collection discuss a wide range of topics that fall under the rubric of "youth," which is a key subject in Mark Twain's writings. The first section offers biographical commentary, mainly dealing with Twain's childhood but also with his later family life, especially the events surrounding the deaths of three of his four children. Other essays address the importance of life events on Twain's fiction and autobiography-for instance, how the death of his infant son Langdon impacted the composition of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. And still others look at Twain's writing in the framework of 19th-century children's literature; how the racial divide created by slavery affected his diverse images of childhood; diseases of infancy in the 19th century; the specific ways gender, orphanage, adoption, and cross-dressing were expressed in his portraits of youth; the much-debated meaning of Twain's attraction to young girls-whom he saw as "surrogate granddaughters"-in late life; and the effect on his reputation of evolving ideas in the field of "childhood studies" (discussed in an essay by Andrew Levy). This book will prove valuable in a wide range of disciplines, including those outside literary studies per se. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty.
