The Divided Mind of America’s Best-Loved Writer, Mark Twain, in His Works

Levy introduces Mark Twain, who became an adult among the years of early civil war and examines the development of industrialization among the Gilded age, just as the proliferation of theory and easy money scam and investigates the strain between America’s grip of present day, urban, and mechanical life and its wistfulness of country effortlessness. This book is a short life story of Samuel Langhorne Clemens, otherwise called by his pen name, Mark Twain, which is very organized and yet in addition and coherent. This book analyzes the bondage and race relations and the long-lasting development of the subject’s own mentalities toward them. Mark Twain is a noteworthy American author from Missouri. His books and accounts are acclaimed for their cleverness, striking subtleties, and vital character. Levy’s life story relates to the life of its subject to the more extensive topics and advancements of occasions.

The purpose of this book is to inform readers about Mark Twain’s life and American history. The writer utilized bunch of sources from Mark Twain’s book such as 1The Gilded Age, Life on the Mississippi, Huckleberry Finn, Roughing it and from heaps of different books, journalism, articles and many more about Mark Twain written by different authors and publishers. Levy discusses Mark Twain’s life and interfaces it to the notable occasions of America that Twain has seen and experienced. The creator also acknowledges that he had 2“the pleasure of discussing Mark Twain and various of his works with hundreds of his undergraduates at the University of Oklahoma”. Therefore, the author has proposed the book for general and understudies who are keen on American history and somebody who is an admirer of Mark Twain. The author talks about how Twain witnessed historic events such as: 3slavery, the famous Comstock lode, civil war, the discovery of the Great Plains, the great “compromise” of 1820 and many more, and how each one of those events affected him personally.

The author is extremely one-sided towards Mark Twain. He describes Mark Twain as 4“his own sparkling personality, unorthodox habits, flashing wit, and natural sociability”. Levy always portrays Mark Twain as a very charming, humorous, intelligent, handsome and attractive person. The author does not control the material because the book depends on an individual’s memoir, which is incorporated with realities and not fiction. The author is very detailed about describing each occasions of Mark Twain’s life. The book was well written, easy to pursue and readable for all. It is well organized because it starts off with Mark Twain’s childhood and goes in chronological order. In the first place, it talks about Twain’s adolescence, where he was brought up, at that point his adulthood in which he battled a great deal to profit and afterward later to his acclaimed stories and nobles, and lastly, Levy talks about Twain’s death.

Another thing that Levy explores is the clashing nature of man: was Twain that sentimental visionary who cherished the slower life of the waterway towns of his childhood or was he the cash grubbing Gilded Age-r, continually searching for a quick score. The writer begins of the first chapter of his book with the battle of Twain’s dad attempting to stay aware of all the business that he continues falling flat. The writer isn't exceptionally clear about what sort of individual Twain was, the point at which it went to his reverence for working. 5Levy discusses about Twain working in “a grocery store and a book store and paper route; he did menial jobs at the office of the Hannibal Gazette” and at a distribution store called Enterprise, at the age of sixteen years old, and furthermore worked as a pilot on the Mississippi for couple of years. Levy also discusses about Twin publishing articles that he worked on by himself on some of the publication stores that he worked at. Twain’s books generally comprise of the experience that he has happened during his childhood, during his life as a pilot on the Mississippi and many more. 6“He had lived in New York and Cincinnati, in Philadelphia and St. Louis and Virginia City and San Francisco and Honolulu; he knew the streets of Memphis and New Orleans and Salt Lake City.” Twain also went on different places of the United States and wrote letters to some of the publication stores that he worked for, about the things that he saw and experienced during his travel, and in exchange he got paid for each letter that he composed. Afterward, Twain at last chooses to compose books and got very famous. Therefore, Levy leaves us to the confusion of whether Twain is a dedicating man, who cherished profiting money or whether he loves the marvelous existence of composing stories and nobles.

The author shows Mark Twain as a very non-judgmental, kind and liberal. Levy points out 7“the remarkable thing about Mark Twain’s attitude toward African Americans is the greatest distance he traveled toward sympathy, tolerance, and outrage at the injustices to which blacks were subjected, both in America and worldwide”. The author talks about Mark Twain’s perspective of slavery and the things that he has witnessed. 8“He had seen slavery and had known salves. He had experienced poverty and had witnessed more than his share of violence and death.” Ever since Twain was a child, he had witnessed some horrifying events about slavery such as his parents raising their hands at their slave and later selling her to other white family and was constantly bothered by those actions even when no one said it was the wrong thing to do so. Twain even wrote some books 9“against slavery and discrimination in Huckleberry Finn, Connecticut Yankee, and Pudd’nhead Wilson, he spoke against the evils of race hatred and mob violence”. Twain is described as a very liberal individual that supports freedom and quality. He made arguments against slavery, felt insulted towards American foreign policy after 1898 and numerous other inhumane activities that were happening. One of the example Levy expressed of Twain’s positive intention towards humanistic actions is that Twain 10“favored the Spanish-American War, seeing it as a noble attempt to rescue the people of Cuba from Spanish tyranny”.

Levy clearly thought of Mark Twain as an exceedingly author. Mark Twain’s readers were a fond of his works because his books were loaded up with emotions, laughter and nostalgic. Levy states “the books that he wrote during those fifteen years were so highly regarded by millions of people who bought and read them that he became securely and permanently embedded in the affections of the American people.” One reason he was a well-known writer was because his books were accessible to a wide range of readers and could likewise be read on various dimensions. It was entertaining and practically simple to pursue. Levy discusses about American history as he discusses about Twain’s autobiography. Twain talks about the troubling industrial conditions of the United States.