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21 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Three supreme masterpieces, one ornery let-down., August 2, 2001
This review is from: The Mysterious Stranger and Other Stories (Dover Thrift Editions) (Paperback)
this volume spans the length of Mark Twain's career, and contains some of his most famous shorter works, which all centre on the subject of Money. 'The Celebrated jumping frog of Calaveras County' is the most perfect tall tale in the English language, three flawless pages about Jim Smiley and the bizarre sidelines he would investigate to win a bet, any bet, written in a miraculous mid-19th century California vernacular. If that isn't enough, Twain tops it with the best closing paragraph of any work I have ever read ever. 'The $1,000,000 Bank note' is almost surreal, or Marxist, the story of a derelict made an unwitting guinea pig by two elderly millionaires, curious to see what would happen to an honest but poor man in the possession of such an impractible note. The frightening fetishistic power of currency structures a somewhat creepily benevolent narrative, and the opening paragraphs audaciously cram a novel's worth of misfortune. 'The Man who corrupted Hadleyburg' is the masterpiece here, at once an unforgiving morality tale about the temptation of money on an incorruptible town, and a satire on the crippling effect of bogus social respectability. Twain's irony is at its most relentless here, mixing anger at elite hypocrisy with distaste for the savage mob mentality. The scenes of public justice are hilarious but terrifying; the unnamed man taking monstrous revenge on a whole town for a personal slight, exposing its shams by an experiment, could well be Twain himself. The same could be said of the hero of his novella 'The Mysterious Stranger', Twain's last, posthumously published work. In this, an angel, Satan, nephew of his infernal namesake, comes to a late 16th century Austrian mountain village and systematically exposes the murderous herd instincts, moral deceptions and shabby pretensions of the human condition. Everything - war, religion, society, justice, family, human aspiration, childhood innocence - is ground down with misanthropic, sub-Swiftian satire. 'Stranger' is not an easy book to like. As an historical novel, it is an utter failure, with no attempt to understand the mindset, never mind the language, idiom or customs of an alien culture. As an allegory for the contemporary America in which Twain was writing, the book is indispensible, insightful, brave, bracing, honest, incredibly prescient, but monotonous, flatly written and exhausting. As a supernatural fable, the book has little sense of wonder or of the unknown, but in its story of a devil wreaking subversive havoc on a socially repressive culture by playing on their hypocritical terms, 'Stranger' does look forward to Bulgakov's more successful 'The Master and Margarita'.
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23 of 26 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Mysterious Stranger is Essential Today, March 23, 2002
This review is from: The Mysterious Stranger and Other Stories (Dover Thrift Editions) (Paperback)
I have taught this book at the college level for a few years now; it definitely sheds Twain's unfortunate Americana image, and it reveals the darker genius of this "beloved" author. Twain's greatest work, The Mysterious Stranger will enrage fundamentalist Christians, several of whom have dropped my course because of this novella. Asking people to think about what is real, what is behind existence, though, is no crime and should be inoffensive. Young people who are harmed by systematic thinking will react to this book like people being deprogrammed from a cult: they will hate it. But Twain, who was in anguish when he wrote this, had the honesty to ask difficult questions. Read The Mysterious Stranger as a guide to Twain's futuristic thinking, his tribute to the mind above all other things.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Mystical. Dark. Engaging., January 15, 2008
Warning: DO NOT Read This Story Before Sleep!
Dark, mysterious, and terrifying are trivial descriptions of Mark Twain's "The Mysterious Stranger." Twain's cynical outlook on life is reflected in his depiction of human nature as the story advances. Set in 1590 Austrian village of Eseldorf, whose German translation means "stupid village," the reader already feels captivated by this strange etymology. In such a dreamy village with no strict class structure, no one has been taught to challenge authority since there has been none--yet. A handsome mysterious stranger introduces himself to the gullible Theodore and his friends, performing chilling miracles that amaze the kids who now think he is an "angel." And oh, did I forget to mention that this stranger calls himself Satan?
Before engaging in a lengthy discussion of the story's themes, an idea of the author's life is necessary to understand some of the horrid scenes in "The Mysterious Stranger." Mark Twain was not rich. He was one of the three survivors in his family, as his four other siblings died before reaching six years of age. His dad died when he was 11 and his brother in a steamboat accident not 8 years later. Twain's wife died after 34 years of marriage followed by his two dear daughters at their late twenties. In summary, by 1909, Twain was only left with a sister and a melancholic soul that is reflected in his famous writings.
With Twain's life in mind, it becomes clear why many scenes of death and torture exist in this short story. Satan creates humans out of clay but crushes them while announcing, "We angels cannot do bad, for we do not know what it is." It is simply ironic that a heavenly angel would do so, for his actions nullify his assertions. It is these ironies that Twain wants his readers to understand. Many critics have asserted that Twain agrees with Satan but only to a certain extent. We cannot deny our selfishness when we battle over territories and religion, but we must rebuke that we are "worse than animals," as Satan tells the kids.
In these 50 pages, Satan focuses only on three things: proving human's worthlessness, weakness, and immorality. Moral Sense is a major theme in this book, as Satan tries to prove that our possession of it, or our ability to differentiate between what is good and what is bad, is the main cause that we hate, fight, and kill. The irony here, however, is that Satan never discusses the opposite, namely our possession of moral sense as seen in such peace-making people as Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr., and Mohandas Gandhi.
To entice the reader, Twain uses many elements of Dark Romanticism that fortify his mystical mood of the story. From the opening chapters, we see supernatural elements in Satan's creations. Later on, Twain discusses why we choose to declare war instead of peace, depicting our flaws and selfishness. Since all humans, according to Satan, are imperfect, then they are prone to sinning and falling. As seen in Satan's repetition of our failure in history, there can be no improvement since all we do is worsen. The mystical "miracles"--if you want to call them so--that Satan perform also represent the supernatural and ghostly elements of Dark Romanticism beliefs.
With bizarre and supernatural elements that immediately attract your mind and attention, with Twain's morbid perception of life that renders the story more terrifying, and with your curiosity of unveiling our undeniable flaws presented by Satan, I really believe that this short story is a worthwhile read that will keep you in your seat until you finish it.
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