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Edited by

Harriet Elinor Smith

Associate Editors

Benjamin Griffin, Victor Fischer, Michael B. Frank,
Sharon K. Goetz, Leslie Diane Myrick

Contributing Editors

Natalia Cecire, Michelle Coleman, George Derk,
Christine Hong, Rachel Perez, Leslie Walton

A Publication of the Mark Twain Project
of The Bancroft Library

General Editor, Robert H. Hirst

University of California Press
Berkeley   Los Angeles   London

2010

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The Mark Twain Project is an editorial and publishing program of
The Bancroft Library, working since 1967 to create a comprehensive
critical edition of everything Mark Twain wrote.

This volume is the first one in that edition to be published simultaneously
in print and as an electronic text at http://www.marktwainproject.org.
The textual commentaries for all Mark Twain texts in this volume
are published only here.

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Board of Directors of the Mark Twain Project

Jo Ann Boydston
Laura Cerruti
Don L. Cook
Frederick Crews
Charles B. Faulhaber
Peter E. Hanff
Thomas C. Leonard
Michael Millgate
George A. Starr
G. Thomas Tanselle
Lynne Withey

Autobiography of Mark Twain, Volume 1 Copyright© 2010, 2001 by the Mark Twain Foundation. All Rights Reserved. Transcription, reconstruction, and creation of the texts, introduction, notes, and appendixes Copyright© 2010 by The Regents of the University of California. The Mark Twain Foundation expressly reserves to itself, its successors and assigns, all dramatization rights in every medium, including without limitation, stage, radio, television, motion picture, and public reading rights, in and to the Autobiography of Mark Twain and all other texts by Mark Twain in copyright to the Mark Twain Foundation.

All texts by Mark Twain in Autobiography of Mark Twain, Volume 1 have been published previously, by permission of the Mark Twain Foundation, in the Mark Twain Project’s Microfilm Edition of Mark Twain’s Literary Manuscripts Available in the Mark Twain Papers, The Bancroft Library, University of California Berkeley (Berkeley: The Bancroft Library, 2001), and some texts have been published previously in one or more of the following: Albert Bigelow Paine, editor, Mark Twain’s Autobiography (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1924); Bernard DeVoto, editor, Mark Twain in Eruption (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1940); Charles Neider, editor, The Autobiography of Mark Twain, Including Chapters Now Published for the First Time (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1959). Unless otherwise noted, all illustrations are reproduced from original documents in the Mark Twain Papers of The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley.

mark twain project ® is a registered trademark of The Regents of the University of California in the United States and the European Community.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
[for the printed volume published by University of California Press]

Twain, Mark, 1835–1910
　　[Autobiography]
　　Autobiography of Mark Twain, Volume 1 / editor: Harriet Elinor Smith ;
associate editors: Benjamin Griffin, Victor Fischer, Michael B. Frank, Sharon K. Goetz, Leslie Diane Myrick
　　　　p. cm. — (The Mark Twain Papers)
　　“A publication of the Mark Twain Project of The Bancroft Library.”
　　Includes bibliographical references and index.
　　 isbn 978-0-520-26719-0 (cloth : alk. paper)
　　1. Twain, Mark, 1835–1910. 　2. Authors, American—19th century—Biography. 　I. Smith, Harriet Elinor. 　II. Griffin, Benjamin, 1968– 　III. Fischer, Victor, 1942– 　IV. Frank, Michael B. 　V. Goetz, Sharon K. 　VI. Myrick, Leslie Diane. 　VII. Bancroft Library. 　VIII. Title.
　　PS1331.A2 2010
　　818'.4'0924—dc22　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　2009047700
Manufactured in the United States of America

Editorial work for this volume has been supported
by a generous gift to the Mark Twain Project of
The Bancroft Library from the

KORET FOUNDATION

and by matching and outright grants from the

NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR THE HUMANITIES,
an independent federal agency.

Without that support, this volume could not
have been produced.

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The Mark Twain Project at the University of California,
Berkeley, gratefully acknowledges generous support from the
following, for editorial work on the Autobiography of Mark
Twain and for the acquisition of important new documents:

The University of California, Berkeley, Class of 1958
Members of the Mark Twain Luncheon Club
The Barkley Fund
The Mark Twain Foundation

The Beatrice Fox Auerbach Foundation Fund at the Hartford
　Foundation for Public Giving
Lawrence E. Brooks
Helen Kennedy Cahill
Kimo Campbell
Virginia Robinson Furth
The Herrick Fund
The Hofmann Foundation
The House of Bernstein, Inc.
Robert and Beverly Middlekauff
The Renee B. Fisher Foundation
The Benjamin and Susan Shapell Foundation
Jeanne and Leonard Ware
Patricia Wright, in memory of Timothy J. Fitzgerald

and

The thousands of individual donors over the past fifty years
who have helped sustain the ongoing work
of the Mark Twain Project.

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The publication of this volume has been made possible
by a gift to the University of California Press Foundation by

WILSON GARDNER COMBS
FRANK MARION GIFFORD COMBS

in honor of

WILSON GIFFORD COMBS
BA 1935, MA 1950, University of California, Berkeley

MARYANNA GARDNER COMBS
MSW 1951, University of California, Berkeley

List of Manuscripts and Dictations 　 xiv

Acknowledgments 　 xvii

Introduction 　 1

Preliminary Manuscripts and Dictations, 1870–1905 　 59

AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MARK TWAIN 　 201

Explanatory Notes 　 469

Appendixes

Samuel L. Clemens: A Brief Chronology 　 651

Family Biographies 　 654

Speech at the Seventieth Birthday Dinner, 5 December 1905 　 657

. . . Souvenir of Its Celebration

Speech at The Players, 3 January 1906 　 662

Previous Publication 　 663

Note on the Text 　 669

Guide to the Textual Apparatus

Textual Commentaries

Word Division in This Volume 　 680

References 　 681

Index 　 713

Photographs precede p. 203

Except for the subtitle “Random Extracts from It” (which Clemens himself enclosed in brackets), bracketed titles have been editorially supplied for works that Clemens left untitled.

      Preliminary Manuscripts and Dictations, 1870–1905
1870      [The Tennessee Land] 　 61
1877      [Early Years in Florida, Missouri] 　 64
1885      The Grant Dictations 　 66
The Chicago G. A. R. Festival 　 67
[A Call with W. D. Howells on General Grant] 　 70
Grant and the Chinese 　 72
Gerhardt 　 74
About General Grant’s Memoirs 　 75
[The Rev. Dr. Newman] 　 99
1890, 1893–94      The Machine Episode 　 101
1897      Travel-Scraps I 　 107
1898      Four Sketches about Vienna 　 118
[Beauties of the German Language] 　 118
[Comment on Tautology and Grammar] 　 119
[A Group of Servants] 　 120
[A Viennese Procession] 　 124
1898      My Debut as a Literary Person 　 127
1898–99      Horace Greeley 　 145
1898–99      Lecture-Times 　 146
1898–99      Ralph Keeler 　 150
1900      Scraps from My Autobiography. From Chapter IX 　 155
1900      Scraps from My Autobiography. Private History of a Manuscript That Came to Grief 　 164
1903      [Reflections on a Letter and a Book] 　 181
1903      [Something about Doctors] 　 188
1904      [Henry H. Rogers] 　 192
1905      [Anecdote of Jean] 　 199

      AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MARK TWAIN
1906      An Early Attempt 203
1897–98      My Autobiography [Random Extracts from It] 　 203
1906      The Latest Attempt 　 220
1906      The Final (and Right) Plan 　 220
1906      Preface. As from the Grave 　 221
1904      The Florentine Dictations 　 222
[John Hay] 　 222
Notes on “Innocents Abroad” 　 225
[Robert Louis Stevenson and Thomas Bailey Aldrich] 　 228
[Villa di Quarto] 　 230
1906      Autobiographical Dictations, January–March 　 250
     

9 January	250	7 February	337	8 March	396
10 January	254	8 February	341	9 March	400
11 January	260	9 February	346	12 March	403
12 January	267	12 February	350	14 March	407
13 January	273	13 February	354	15 March	409
15 January	276	14 February	357	16 March	417
16 January	283	15 February	359	20 March	421
17 January	287	16 February	363	21 March	429
18 January	292	20 February	367	22 March	432
19 January	294	21 February	369	23 March	436
23 January	302	22 February	373	26 March	439
24 January	315	23 February	376	27 March	446
1 February	319	26 February	379	28 March	451
2 February	323	5 March	385	29 March	455
5 February	328	6 March	389	30 March	462
6 February	334	7 March	392

Intensive editorial work on the Autobiography of Mark Twain began some six years ago and will continue for several more years. But the collective skills and expertise that have allowed us to solve the daunting problems posed by this manuscript came gradually into existence over four decades of editorial work on Mark Twain. We therefore thank the National Endowment for the Humanities, an independent federal agency, both for its three most recent outright and matching grants over the last six years, and for its patient, generous, and uninterrupted support of the Mark Twain Project since 1966. At the same time and with the same fervor, we thank the Koret Foundation for its recent generous grant in support of editorial and production work on the Autobiography, all of which has gone (or will go) to satisfy the matching component of the Endowment’s recent grants to the Project.

For additional continuing support of work on the Autobiography and for help in acquiring important original documents for the Mark Twain Papers, we thank those institutions and individuals listed on page ix. The Mark Twain Project has been sustained over the years in so many ways by so many people that we are obliged, with regret, to thank them as one large group rather than by individual names. For donations to sustain our work, ranging from five dollars to five million dollars, we here thank all our loyal and generous supporters. Without their support, the Project would long ago have ceased to exist, and would certainly not be completing work on the Autobiography at this time.

Recent efforts have been made to create an endowment to support the present and future work of the Mark Twain Project, and we want to acknowledge those efforts here. First and foremost we thank all the members of the University of California, Berkeley, Class of 1958, led by Roger and Jeane Samuelsen, Edward H. Peterson, and Don and Bitsy Kosovac, who recently created an endowment of $1 million dedicated to the Mark Twain Project. We thank each and every member of the Class for their far-seeing wisdom and generosity. To that endowment fund we may now add, with renewed gratitude, contributions from the estate of Phyllis  R. Bogue and the estate of Peter K. Oppenheim.

Instrumental in all recent fund-raising for the Project has been the Mark Twain Luncheon Club, organized ten years ago by Ira Michael Heyman, Watson M. (Mac) Laetsch, and Robert Middlekauff. Their leadership has been unflagging and indispensable, and we thank them for it and for a thousand other forms of help. We also thank all of the Club’s nearly one hundred members for their loyal financial and moral support of the Project, and on their behalf we extend thanks to the several dozen speakers who have agreed to address the Luncheon Club members over the years. Our thanks also go to Dave Duer, director of development in the Berkeley University Library, for his continuing wise and judicious counsel, and for his unprecedented efforts to raise financial support for the Project. Last but not least we want to thank the Berkeley campus as a whole for granting the Project relief from indirect costs on its several grants from the Endowment. We are grateful for this and all other forms of support from our home institution.

We thank the staff of the University Library and The Bancroft Library at Berkeley, especially Thomas C. Leonard, University Librarian; Charles Faulhaber, the James D. Hart Director of The Bancroft Library; and Peter E. Hanff, its Deputy Director, all of whom serve on the Board of Directors of the Mark Twain Project. To them and to the other members of the Board—​Jo Ann Boydston, Laura Cerruti, Don L. Cook, Frederick Crews, Michael Millgate, George A. Starr, G. Thomas Tanselle, and Lynne Withey—we are indebted for multiple forms of moral and intellectual support.

Scholars and archivists at other institutions have been vital to editorial work on this volume. Barbara Schmidt, an independent scholar who maintains an invaluable website (www.twainquotes.com) for Mark Twain research, tops our list when it comes to information and documentation freely and generously volunteered. For this particular volume she also provided us with photocopies of important original documents not previously known to us. Kevin Mac Donnell, an expert dealer and collector of Mark Twain documents, has as always been generous in sharing his extensive collection. Photographs and other documentation were also provided by the following, to whom we express our thanks: Lee Brumbaugh of the Nevada Historical Society, Reno; Christine Montgomery of The State Historical Society of Missouri, Columbia; Patti Philippon of the Mark Twain House and Museum, Hartford; and Henry Sweets of the Mark Twain Boyhood Home and Museum, Hannibal. At our own university, we are grateful to Dan Johnston of the Digital Imaging Laboratory for generating superb digital files from negatives of rare photographs. We would also like to thank the following archivists who generously assisted us in our research: Louise A. Merriam of the Andersen Library, University of Minnesota; Eva Guggemos and Sandra Markham of the Beinecke Library at Yale University; and Kathleen Kienholz of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York. Patricia Thayer Muno and James R. Toncray contributed important information about their families.

We are grateful for the tireless help of Kathleen MacDougall, our highly skilled copy editor and project manager at UC Press, who contributed much to the accuracy of the editorial matter and was a guiding hand at every stage of the production process. We thank Sandy Drooker, who designed the book and the dust jacket with her usual consummate skill. As of old, we again thank Sam Rosenthal, who expertly supervised the printing and binding process, and Laura Cerruti, our sponsoring editor, whose enthusiasm and support for this edition were essential to its publication.

All volumes produced by the Mark Twain Project are the products of complex and sustained collaboration. The student employees listed on page iii as Contributing Editors carried out much of the preliminary work of transcribing, proofreading, and collating the source documents that form the basis of the critical text. Associate editors Benjamin Griffin, Victor Fischer, and Michael B. Frank contributed to every aspect of the editorial work. They carried out original research for and drafted much of the annotation, and helped with the painstaking preparation and checking required to produce accurate texts, apparatus, and index. Associate editors Sharon K. Goetz and Leslie Diane Myrick brought their unmatched technical expertise and innovative programming to bear on the challenge of publishing this edition simultaneously in print and on Mark Twain Project Online (www.marktwainproject.org), with last-minute assistance from Dan Fabulich. None of us would be able to edit as we do without the Project’s administrative assistant, Neda Salem, who skillfully held the bureaucracy at bay and patiently answered the myriad requests for information and copies of documents which the Project receives from scholars and the general public.

We wish to express special gratitude to my colleague Lin Salamo, who retired from the Project before this volume was completed. After more than two decades of dedicated editorial work, she contributed to this edition what is arguably her most significant professional accomplishment—reassembling and analyzing the hundreds of typescript pages that make up the Autobiographical Dictations. Her research was the indispensable key to our new understanding of Mark Twain’s plan for his autobiography.

H. E. S.