From Publishers Weekly
Students of Mark Twain have generally preferred to see him as a rebel; here Krauth, who teaches English at the University of Colorado-Boulder, issues them a challenge. His detailed, scholarly study marshals evidence that Twain "was on the side of orthodoxy" and "the product of his culture." Each of the eight chapters describes a type of Victorian writer--the moralist, the sentimentalist, the travel writer, etc.--and places Twain in that tradition. Most of Twain's full-length books are covered, including the much-neglected A Tramp Abroad and Following the Equator. Krauth takes up Twain's love letters to Olivia Langdon and shows that they are "thoroughly literary," and reveals how Twain's courtship forced him into respectability to impress the conservative Langdon family. Krauth deftly explores Twain's literary personae as repentant sinner, gentleman, man of feeling, man of the world and man of letters. Krauth's approach allows him to account easily for passages that have stumped other critics, usefully correcting the one-sided view of Twain as purely radical. But Krauth's thorough catalogue of conventional attitudes and statements in these books does not suffice to prove his broader point, and he is forced to acknowledge a "self-loathing, socially subversive other within [Twain]." As strikingly conventional as Twain may have been in some respects, there's no denying that the great satirist found the urge to thumb his nose at society all but irrepressible. (Aug.)
Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
The Mark Twain who emerges from these pages probably won't please readers who like to see him as an irreverent opponent of sentimentality and social convention. But by looking at Twain's career from beginning to end, Krauth (English, Univ. of Colorado, Boulder) makes a strong case that, whatever role transgressive humor played in his work, in Mark Twain Sam Clemens tried to project the persona of the Victorian gentleman. Krauth's re-examination of Twain via this lens highlights some interesting issuesATwain's concern with sentiment (or "right feelings"); the conventional, scarcely unbuttoned self-portrait presented in selections of the autobiography that appeared, late in Twain's life, in the North American Review; and the symbolism of Twain's famous white linen suit, which he sported in the last decade of his life. Although Krauth may neglect the transgressive in Twain's genius, his view of Twain sheds new light on the man and artist. Recommended for all libraries. Charles Nash, Cottey Coll., Nevada, MO
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
