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Mark Twain, Mississippi Writings
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Mark Twain, Mississippi Writings Hardback - 1982

by Mark Twain; Guy Cardwell (Editor)

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Reader reviews for Mark Twain, Mississippi Writings

From the publisher

This Library of America collection presents Twain's best-known works, including Adventures of Hucklebery Finn, together in one volume for the first time.

Tom Sawyer "is simply a hymn," said its author, "put into prose form to give it a worldly air," a book where nostalgia is so strong that it dissolves the tensions and perplexities that assert themselves in the later works. Twain began Huckleberry Finn the same year Tom Sawyer was published, but he was unable to complete it for several more. It was during this period of uncertainty that Twain made a pilgrimage to the scenes of his childhood in Hannibal, Missouri, a trip that led eventually to Life on the Mississippi. The river in Twain's descriptions is a bewitching mixture of beauty and power, seductive calms and treacherous shoals, pleasure and terror, an image of the societies it touches and transports.

Each of these works is filled with comic and melodramatic adventure, with horseplay and poetic evocations of scenery, and with characters who have become central to American mythology--not only Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn, but also Roxy, the mulatto slave in Puddn'head Wilson, one of the most telling portraits of a woman in American fiction. With each book there is evidence of a growing bafflement and despair, until with Puddn'head Wilson, high jinks and games, far from disguising the terrible cost of slavery, become instead its macabre evidence.

Through each of four works, too, runs the Mississippi, the river that T. S. Eliot, echoing Twain, was to call the "strong brown god." For Twain, the river represented the complex and often contradictory possibilities in his own and his nation's life. The Mississippi marks the place where civilization, moving west with its comforts and proprieties, discovers and contends with the rough realities, violence, chicaneries, and promise of freedom on the frontier. It is the place, too, where the currents Mark Twain learned to navigate as a pilot--an experience recounted in Life on the Mississippi--move inexorably into the Deep South, so that the innocence of joyful play and boyhood along its shores eventually confronts the grim reality of slavery.

LIBRARY OF AMERICA is an independent nonprofit cultural organization founded in 1979 to preserve our nation's literary heritage by publishing, and keeping permanently in print, America's best and most significant writing. The Library of America series includes more than 300 volumes to date, authoritative editions that average 1,000 pages in length, feature cloth covers, sewn bindings, and ribbon markers, and are printed on premium acid-free paper that will last for centuries.

Details

  • Title Mark Twain, Mississippi Writings
  • Author Mark Twain; Guy Cardwell (Editor)
  • Binding Hardback
  • Edition Later Printing
  • Pages 1126
  • Volumes 1
  • Language ENG
  • Publisher Library of America, New York
  • Publication date 1982-11-01
  • Features Bookmark, Dust Cover, Table of Contents
  • ISBN 9780940450073 / 0940450070
  • Weight 1.58 lbs (0.72 kg)
  • Dimensions 8.16 x 5.4 x 1.42 in (20.73 x 13.72 x 3.61 cm)
  • Age range 18 to UP years
  • Grade levels 13 - UP
  • Themes
    • Cultural Region: Deep South
    • Cultural Region: Mid-South
    • Cultural Region: South
    • Geographic Orientation: Mississippi
  • Category Literature - Classics / Criticism
  • Library of Congress subjects Mississippi River - Literary collections
  • Library of Congress Catalogue Number 82009917
  • Dewey Decimal Code FIC

About the author

Mark Twain was born Samuel Langhorne Clemens in Florida, Missouri, in 1835, and died at Redding, Connecticut in 1910. In his person and in his pursuits he was a man of extraordinary contrasts. Although he left school at twelve when his father died, he was eventually awarded honorary degrees from Yale University, the University of Missouri, and Oxford University. His career encompassed such varied occupations as printer, Mississippi riverboat pilot, journalist, travel writer, and publisher. He made fortunes from his writing but toward the end of his life he had to resort to lecture tours to pay his debts. He was hot-tempered, profane, and sentimental--and also pessimistic, cynical, and tortured by self-doubt. His nostalgia helped produce some of his best books. He lives in American letters as a great artist, the writer whom William Dean Howells called "the Lincoln of our literature."

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Mark Twain : Mississippi Writings : Tom Sawyer, Life on the Mississippi, Huckleberry Finn,...
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Mark Twain : Mississippi Writings : Tom Sawyer, Life on the Mississippi, Huckleberry Finn, Pudd'nhead Wilson (Library of America)

by Mark Twain

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Library of America, 1982-11-01. Hardcover. Good. 1.4173 8.1496 5.2362.
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Mark Twain: Mississippi Writings (LOA #5) : The Adventures of Tom Sawyer / Life on the...

Mark Twain: Mississippi Writings (LOA #5) : The Adventures of Tom Sawyer / Life on the Mississippi / Adventures of Huckleberry Finn / Pudd'nhead Wilson

by Mark Twain

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Library of America, The, 1982. Hardcover. Acceptable. Missing dust jacket; Readable copy. Pages may have considerable notes/highlighting. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less.Dust jacket quality is not guaranteed.
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Mark Twain : Mississippi Writings - The Adventure of Tom Swayer; Life on the Mississippi;...

Mark Twain : Mississippi Writings - The Adventure of Tom Swayer; Life on the Mississippi; Adventure of Huckleberry Finn; Pudd'Nhead Wilson

by Mark Twain

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  • Hardback
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ISBN 10 / ISBN 13
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Library of America, The, 1982. Hardcover. Acceptable. Disclaimer:A readable copy. All pages are intact, and the cover is intact. Pages can include considerable notes-in pen or highlighter-but the notes cannot obscure the text. An ex-library book and may have standard library stamps and/or stickers. At ThriftBooks, our motto is: Read More, Spend Less.Dust jacket quality is not guaranteed.
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Mark Twain, Mississippi Writings

Mark Twain, Mississippi Writings

by Twain, Mark

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  • Hardback
Condition
Good
Binding
Hardcover
ISBN 10 / ISBN 13
9780940450073 / 0940450070
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Description:
Library of America, 1982. Hardcover. Good. Missing dust jacket; Pages can have notes/highlighting. Spine may show signs of wear. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less.Dust jacket quality is not guaranteed.
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Mark Twain: Mississippi Writings (LOA #5) : The Adventures of Tom Sawyer / Life on the...
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Library of America, The. Used - Good. Former library copy. Pages intact with minimal writing/highlighting. The binding may be loose and creased. Dust jackets/supplements are not included. Includes library markings. Stock photo provided. Product includes identifying sticker. Better World Books: Buy Books. Do Good.
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Mark Twain: Mississippi Writings (LOA #5) : The Adventures of Tom Sawyer / Life on the...
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Library of America, The. Used - Good. Pages intact with minimal writing/highlighting. The binding may be loose and creased. Dust jackets/supplements are not included. Stock photo provided. Product includes identifying sticker. Better World Books: Buy Books. Do Good.
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A$12.38
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Mark Twain: Mississippi Writings (LOA #5) : The Adventures of Tom Sawyer / Life on the...
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Library of America, The. Used - Very Good. Pages intact with possible writing/highlighting. Binding strong with minor wear. Dust jackets/supplements may not be included. Stock photo provided. Product includes identifying sticker. Better World Books: Buy Books. Do Good.
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Mark Twain: Mississippi Writings (LOA #5) : The Adventures of Tom Sawyer / Life on the...
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Description:
Library of America, The. Used - Good. Pages intact with minimal writing/highlighting. The binding may be loose and creased. Dust jackets/supplements are not included. Stock photo provided. Product includes identifying sticker. Better World Books: Buy Books. Do Good.
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A$12.38
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Mark Twain, Mississippi Writings
Stock photo: cover may vary

Mark Twain, Mississippi Writings

by Twain, Mark

  • Used
  • Good
  • Hardback
Condition
Good
Binding
Hardcover
ISBN 10 / ISBN 13
9780940450073 / 0940450070
Quantity available
1
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Item price
A$12.76
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Description:
Library of America, 1982. Hardcover. Good. Pages can have notes/highlighting. Spine may show signs of wear. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less.Shelf and handling wear to cover and binding, with general signs of previous use. Secure packaging for safe delivery.Dust jacket quality is not guaranteed.
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A$12.76
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Mark Twain, Mississippi Writings
Stock photo: cover may vary

Mark Twain, Mississippi Writings

by Twain, Mark

  • Used
  • Good
  • Hardback
Condition
Good
Binding
Hardcover
ISBN 10 / ISBN 13
9780940450073 / 0940450070
Quantity available
1
Seller
Item price
A$12.76
Free Delivery to USA

Show details

Description:
Library of America, 1982. Hardcover. Good. Pages can have notes/highlighting. Spine may show signs of wear. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less.Shelf and handling wear to cover and binding, with general signs of previous use. Binding is tight and structurally sound. Clean interior pages. Slipcase included. Secure packaging for safe delivery.Dust jacket quality is not guaranteed.
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Item price
A$12.76
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