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Mark Twain

146 quotesWriter · Born Nov 30, 1835 · Died Apr 21, 1910 · American · Male

Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, entrepreneur, publisher, and lecturer. Among his novels are The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876) and its sequel, the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885), the latter often called "The Great American Novel". Twain was raised in Hannibal, Missouri, which later provided the setting for Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. He served an apprenticeship with a printer and then worked as a typesetter, contributing articles to the newspaper of his older brother Orion Clemens. He later became a riverboat pilot on the Mississippi River before heading west to join Orion in Nevada. He referred humorously to his lack of success at mining, turning to journalism for the Virginia City Territorial Enterprise. His humorous story, "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County", was published in 1865, based on a story that he heard at Angels Hotel in Angels Camp, California where he had spent some time as a miner. The short story brought international attention and was even translated into classic Greek. His wit and satire, in prose and in speech, earned praise from critics and peers, and he was a friend to presidents, artists, industrialists, and European royalty. Twain earned a great deal of money from his writings and lectures, but he invested in ventures that lost most of it—notably the Paige Compositor, a mechanical typesetter that failed because of its complexity and imprecisio

All humanity (25)Life (16)Wisdom (11)Truth (11)Reality (10)humor (9)Human Nature (9)Learning (8)stupidity (8)Self-awareness (8)Thoughts (7)Funny (7)Relationships (7)Religion (7)Imagination (7)

From “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer”

She makes me get up just at the same time every morning; she makes me wash, they comb me all to thunder; she won't let me sleep in the woodshed; I got to wear them blamed clothes that just smothers me, Tom; they don't seem to let any air git through 'em, somehow; and they're so rotten nice that I…

Work consists of whatever a body is OBLIGED to do, and...Play consists of whatever a body is not obliged to do.

He had discovered a great law of human action, without knowing it — namely, that in order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to obtain.

Tom appeared on the sidewalk with a bucket of whitewash and a long-handled brush. He surveyed the fence, and all gladness left him and a deep melancholy settled down upon his spirit. Thirty yards of board fence nine feet high. Life to him seemed hollow, and existence but a burden.

Tom said to himself that it was not such a hollow world, after all. He had discovered a great law of human action, without knowing it -- namely, that in order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to attain.

Wisdom Youth Childhood humanity Law

Huck was always willing to take a hand in any enterprise that offered entertainment and required no capital, for he had a troublesome super-abundance of that sort of time which is not money.

Wisdom Youth Childhood Capitalism Value

When one writes a novel about grown people, he knows exactly where to stop - that is, with a marriage; but when he writes about juveniles, he must stop where he best can.

Wisdom Youth Childhood Marriage novel

Ah, if he could only die temporarily!

Wisdom humor Funny Death temporary death

From “The Innocents Abroad ”

I must have a prodigious quantity of mind; it takes me as much as a week sometimes to make it up.

Guides cannot master the subtleties of the American joke.

Enough, enough, enough! Say no more! Lump the whole thing! say that the Creator made Italy from designs by Michael Angelo!

Virtue never has been as respectable as money.

The people of those foreign countries are very, very ignorant. They looked curiously at the costumes we had brought from the wilds of America. They observed that we talked loudly at table sometimes. They noticed that we looked out for expenses and got what we conveniently could out of a franc, and…

I used to worship the mighty genius of Michael Angelo — that man who was great in poetry, painting, sculpture, architecture — great in every thing he undertook. But I do not want Michael Angelo for breakfast — for luncheon — for dinner — for tea — for supper — for between meals. I like a change,…

I wish Europe would let Russia annihilate Turkey a little--not much, but enough to make it difficult to find the place again without a divining-rod or a diving-bell.

They spell it "Vinci" and pronounce it "Vinchy". Foreigners always spell better than they pronounce.

Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts.

Human Nature Natural humanity cross-culturally sameness

Human nature appears to be just the same, all over the world.

Human Nature Natural humanity cross-culturally sameness

She kept up her compliments, and I kept up my determination to deserve them or die.

compliments Love Relationships deserving live up to your potential

One must travel, to learn. Every day, now, old Scriptural phrases that never possessed any significance for me before, take to themselves a meaning.

Wisdom wholesome Views Men humanity

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