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علم علیه شانس
توی جاکفشی قایم شدم. باید از خودت خجالت بکشی که این جوری راحت خوابیدی، اون هم توی همچین توفان وحشتناکی ... ... ... آخه وقتی یک نفر خوابیده چه طوری میتونه خجالت بکشه؟ این حرفت که منطقی نیست. اونجلاین جان وقتی آدم میخوابه دیگه نمیتونه از چیزی خجالت بکشه؛
120 pages, Paperback
First published June 28, 1980
60 people are currently reading
354 people want to read
About the author
Mark Twain
8,878 books18.7k followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.
Samuel Langhorne Clemens, known by the pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist and essayist. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has produced," with William Faulkner calling him "the father of American literature." His novels include The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876) and its sequel, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884), with the latter often called the "Great American Novel." Twain also wrote A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (1889) and Pudd'nhead Wilson (1894), and co-wrote The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today (1873) with Charles Dudley Warner.
Samuel Langhorne Clemens, known by the pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist and essayist. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has produced," with William Faulkner calling him "the father of American literature." His novels include The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876) and its sequel, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884), with the latter often called the "Great American Novel." Twain also wrote A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (1889) and Pudd'nhead Wilson (1894), and co-wrote The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today (1873) with Charles Dudley Warner.
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Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews
November 7, 2018
بعد از خوندن کتاب به مصاحبهای از «علی مسعودینیا»، مترجم اثر، برخوردم که تکههایی از صحبتهای ایشون رو میذارم:
«روایت خاطرههای آدم و حوا، به نوعی تقابل زیست مردانه و زنانه است و مارک تواین بر تفاوتهای آنها دست میگذارد بهنظر میرسد این روایتها برای مخاطب جذابتر و تأثیرگذارتر است.
بیشتر از مسأله زیست شاید بحث بر سر جهانبینی زنانه و مردانه است. تواین در حقیقت به شکلی کنایی نشان میدهد که از بدو حیات بشر این دو جنس، دو نگاه متفاوت به دنیای پیرامون خود داشتهاند، چه در شیوه تجربه ورزی و چه در نحوه تفسیر دنیا از شگردهایی متمایز بهره میبردند. اما در عین حال کنار هم به نوعی مکمل یکدیگر هستند و هر یک کمبودهای جنس دیگر را جبران میکند و به همین دلیل این رابطه از ابتدای تاریخ تاکنون دوام آورده است.
آدم در داستان او مردی است بیعلاقه به کشف و عمیقشدن در پدیدهها. میلی به فلسفهبافی و تبیین موقعیت خود در جهان ندارد.
زیباییشناسی خاصی در روند زندگیش حکمفرما نیست. در عوض حوا مدام در حال تجربه اندوزی و کشف و قانونمند کردن نظام هستی است. درک زیباییشناسانه دارد و اهل خطر کردن است. مفهوم عشق را درک میکند و در تلاش است این را به مرد زندگی خود نیز بیاموزد. حوا در عین عقلانیت، به فراخور طبع زنانهاش احساساتی هم هست. آدم محافظهکار است و کمحوصله. بر قوای فیزیکی خود تکیه دارد و به دنبال عافیت طلبی است.»
« اکثر داستانها بر اساس موقعیتهای مضحک ساخته شدهاند. تواین آدمیزادی را نقد میکند که خودش را در یک دورانگذار وحشتناک به سمت تجدد قرار داده و در این مخمصه خودساخته گیر کرده و دست و پا میزند. مناسبات بیمار اداری و حکومتی، روابط سرد و قراردادی زندگی زناشویی، تعالیم بیمصرفی که کلیسا به جامعه ارائه میکند، دنیای سرشار از بدطینتی و بزهکاری، ریاکاری روزنامهها و رسانهها و مانندآن دستمایه داستانهای این نویسنده هستند. تواین بیمحابا تمامی اقشار و طبقات اجتماعی را به سخره میگیرد و دست میاندازد.»
«روایت خاطرههای آدم و حوا، به نوعی تقابل زیست مردانه و زنانه است و مارک تواین بر تفاوتهای آنها دست میگذارد بهنظر میرسد این روایتها برای مخاطب جذابتر و تأثیرگذارتر است.
بیشتر از مسأله زیست شاید بحث بر سر جهانبینی زنانه و مردانه است. تواین در حقیقت به شکلی کنایی نشان میدهد که از بدو حیات بشر این دو جنس، دو نگاه متفاوت به دنیای پیرامون خود داشتهاند، چه در شیوه تجربه ورزی و چه در نحوه تفسیر دنیا از شگردهایی متمایز بهره میبردند. اما در عین حال کنار هم به نوعی مکمل یکدیگر هستند و هر یک کمبودهای جنس دیگر را جبران میکند و به همین دلیل این رابطه از ابتدای تاریخ تاکنون دوام آورده است.
آدم در داستان او مردی است بیعلاقه به کشف و عمیقشدن در پدیدهها. میلی به فلسفهبافی و تبیین موقعیت خود در جهان ندارد.
زیباییشناسی خاصی در روند زندگیش حکمفرما نیست. در عوض حوا مدام در حال تجربه اندوزی و کشف و قانونمند کردن نظام هستی است. درک زیباییشناسانه دارد و اهل خطر کردن است. مفهوم عشق را درک میکند و در تلاش است این را به مرد زندگی خود نیز بیاموزد. حوا در عین عقلانیت، به فراخور طبع زنانهاش احساساتی هم هست. آدم محافظهکار است و کمحوصله. بر قوای فیزیکی خود تکیه دارد و به دنبال عافیت طلبی است.»
« اکثر داستانها بر اساس موقعیتهای مضحک ساخته شدهاند. تواین آدمیزادی را نقد میکند که خودش را در یک دورانگذار وحشتناک به سمت تجدد قرار داده و در این مخمصه خودساخته گیر کرده و دست و پا میزند. مناسبات بیمار اداری و حکومتی، روابط سرد و قراردادی زندگی زناشویی، تعالیم بیمصرفی که کلیسا به جامعه ارائه میکند، دنیای سرشار از بدطینتی و بزهکاری، ریاکاری روزنامهها و رسانهها و مانندآن دستمایه داستانهای این نویسنده هستند. تواین بیمحابا تمامی اقشار و طبقات اجتماعی را به سخره میگیرد و دست میاندازد.»
Want to read
August 31, 2024Contains the stories:
From Sketches, New and Old:
The Notorious Jumping Frog of Calaveras County - 3/5 - I expected more from the story that launched Mark Twain's career
The Story of the Bad Little Boy - 4/5 - the real story of what happens to bad little boys
Cannibalism in the Cars - 2/5 - a story of bad "taste" hahahahaha
Niagara - 2/5 - Twain's pre-Yelp vacation complaints
The Capitoline Venus - 3/5 - written response to the "Cardiff Giant" hoax
Journalism in Tennessee - response to "vigorous" journalism of the time
A Curious Dream - 3/5 - a story in which Twain suggests that graveyards should be better maintained
The Facts in the Case of the Great Beef Contract - 3/5 - satirical tale of government bureaucracy
How I Edited an Agricultural Paper - 2/5 - another satirical story about "vigorous" journalism
A Medieval Romance - 4/5 - comical medieval story about inheriting the throne
My Watch - 2/5 - makes you wonder if Twain had problems with getting his watch repaired
Political Economy - 3/5 - those pesky lightning rod salesmen!
Science vs. Luck - 3/5 - is 7-Up a game of chance? Or Science?
The Story of the Good Little Boy - 3/5 - not quite as good as The Story of the Bad Little Boy
A Mysterious Visit - 3/5 - the dangerous of bragging about financial success
From Roughing It:
The Great Landslide Case - 3/5 - absurdity in frontier law
Buck Fanshaw's Funeral - 3/5 - I'm not sure I quite understand these fellows
Captain Ned Blakely - 3/5 - justice delivered
His Grandfather's Old Ram - 3/5 - what was I talking about again?
Dick Baker's Cat - 4/5 - well, at least he landed on his feet...
A Letter from Horace Greeley - 3/5 - another tale of miscommunication, this one centering on sloppy handwriting
From Sketches, New and Old:
A True Story -
Experience of the McWilliamses with Membranous Croup -
From The American Claimant:
Mrs. McWilliams and the Lightning -
From The Mysterious Stranger:
The McWilliamses and the Burglar Alarm -
From Tom Sawyer Abroad:
The Facts concerning the Recent Carnival of Crime in Connecticut -
The Canvasser's Tale -
The Loves of Alonzo Fitz Clarence and Rosannah Ethelton -
From The 30,000 Dollar Bequest:
Edward Mills and George Benton: A Tale -
From A Tramp Abroad:
Jim Baker's Blue-jay Yarn -
The Man Who Put Up at Gadsby's -
From The American Claimant:
A Curious Experience -
In Defense of Harriet Shelley:
The Invalid's Story -
From Tom Sawyer Abroad:
The Stolen White Elephant -
From Life on the Mississippi:
A Dying Man's Confession -
The Professor's Yarn -
A Burning Brand -
From The American Claimant:
The Private History of a Campaign That Failed -
From Sketches, New and Old:
A Ghost Story -
From The American Claimant:
Luck -
Playing Courier -
From The 30,000 Dollar Bequest:
The Californian's Tale -
Extract from Adam's Diary -
Eve's Diary -
From The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg:
The Esquimau Maiden's Romance -
Is He Living or Is He Dead? -
The £1,000,000 Bank-Note -
From Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World:
John Brown' and Mary Taylor -
Cecil Rhodes's Shark -
Why Ed Jackson Called on Commodore Vanderbilt -
From The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg:
The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg -
The Death Disk -
Two Little Tales -
The Belated Russian Passport -
A Double-Barreled Detective Story -
From The 30,000 Dollar Bequest:
The Five Boons of Life -
Was it Heaven? or Hell? -
From The Mysterious Stranger:
A Dog's Tale -
A Horse's Tale -
From The 30,000 Dollar Bequest:
The $30,000 Bequest -
From Europe and Elsewhere:
The War Prayer -
From The Mysterious Stranger:
Hunting the Deceitful Turkey -
Extract from Captain Stormfield's Visit to Heaven -
A Fable -
From The 30,000 Dollar Bequest:
How to Tell a Story -
From Sketches, New and Old:
The Notorious Jumping Frog of Calaveras County - 3/5 - I expected more from the story that launched Mark Twain's career
The Story of the Bad Little Boy - 4/5 - the real story of what happens to bad little boys
Cannibalism in the Cars - 2/5 - a story of bad "taste" hahahahaha
Niagara - 2/5 - Twain's pre-Yelp vacation complaints
The Capitoline Venus - 3/5 - written response to the "Cardiff Giant" hoax
Journalism in Tennessee - response to "vigorous" journalism of the time
A Curious Dream - 3/5 - a story in which Twain suggests that graveyards should be better maintained
The Facts in the Case of the Great Beef Contract - 3/5 - satirical tale of government bureaucracy
How I Edited an Agricultural Paper - 2/5 - another satirical story about "vigorous" journalism
A Medieval Romance - 4/5 - comical medieval story about inheriting the throne
My Watch - 2/5 - makes you wonder if Twain had problems with getting his watch repaired
Political Economy - 3/5 - those pesky lightning rod salesmen!
Science vs. Luck - 3/5 - is 7-Up a game of chance? Or Science?
The Story of the Good Little Boy - 3/5 - not quite as good as The Story of the Bad Little Boy
A Mysterious Visit - 3/5 - the dangerous of bragging about financial success
From Roughing It:
The Great Landslide Case - 3/5 - absurdity in frontier law
Buck Fanshaw's Funeral - 3/5 - I'm not sure I quite understand these fellows
Captain Ned Blakely - 3/5 - justice delivered
His Grandfather's Old Ram - 3/5 - what was I talking about again?
Dick Baker's Cat - 4/5 - well, at least he landed on his feet...
A Letter from Horace Greeley - 3/5 - another tale of miscommunication, this one centering on sloppy handwriting
From Sketches, New and Old:
A True Story -
Experience of the McWilliamses with Membranous Croup -
From The American Claimant:
Mrs. McWilliams and the Lightning -
From The Mysterious Stranger:
The McWilliamses and the Burglar Alarm -
From Tom Sawyer Abroad:
The Facts concerning the Recent Carnival of Crime in Connecticut -
The Canvasser's Tale -
The Loves of Alonzo Fitz Clarence and Rosannah Ethelton -
From The 30,000 Dollar Bequest:
Edward Mills and George Benton: A Tale -
From A Tramp Abroad:
Jim Baker's Blue-jay Yarn -
The Man Who Put Up at Gadsby's -
From The American Claimant:
A Curious Experience -
In Defense of Harriet Shelley:
The Invalid's Story -
From Tom Sawyer Abroad:
The Stolen White Elephant -
From Life on the Mississippi:
A Dying Man's Confession -
The Professor's Yarn -
A Burning Brand -
From The American Claimant:
The Private History of a Campaign That Failed -
From Sketches, New and Old:
A Ghost Story -
From The American Claimant:
Luck -
Playing Courier -
From The 30,000 Dollar Bequest:
The Californian's Tale -
Extract from Adam's Diary -
Eve's Diary -
From The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg:
The Esquimau Maiden's Romance -
Is He Living or Is He Dead? -
The £1,000,000 Bank-Note -
From Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World:
John Brown' and Mary Taylor -
Cecil Rhodes's Shark -
Why Ed Jackson Called on Commodore Vanderbilt -
From The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg:
The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg -
The Death Disk -
Two Little Tales -
The Belated Russian Passport -
A Double-Barreled Detective Story -
From The 30,000 Dollar Bequest:
The Five Boons of Life -
Was it Heaven? or Hell? -
From The Mysterious Stranger:
A Dog's Tale -
A Horse's Tale -
From The 30,000 Dollar Bequest:
The $30,000 Bequest -
From Europe and Elsewhere:
The War Prayer -
From The Mysterious Stranger:
Hunting the Deceitful Turkey -
Extract from Captain Stormfield's Visit to Heaven -
A Fable -
From The 30,000 Dollar Bequest:
How to Tell a Story -
February 8, 2025
• داستان اول خیلی خیلی خیلی خوب بود و راجع به زنی بود در جاکفشی.
• داستان دوم اصلا جذاب نبود.
• داستان سوم هم دوست نداشتمش
خیلی کوتاه بود مثل یه خاطره . هیچ نقطه اوجی نداشت .
• داستان چهارم هیچ جزئیاتی نداشت و نویسنده فقط روایت کرده بود. ترجیح میدادم حداقل مدارکی که جیم ارائه کرد رو توصیف کنه.
• داستان پنجم دوست داشتنی تر بود نسبت به قبلی ها.
• داستان ششم واقعا جالب بود.
• داستان هفتم فقط ایده اش قشنگ بود
• داستان هشتم مجموعه ای از یادداشت های آدم هستش که میگه چجوری شد که سیب رو خوردن و ... به نظرم این داستان هم بامزه و سرگرم کننده بود.
• داستان نهم از همه طولانی تر و کامل تر بود راجع به عقب نشینی های مکرر عده ای در جنگ.
• داستان دهم یادداشت های حوا بود که به نظرم خیلی بامزه بود یه جاهایی .
ولی در کل این کتاب رو دوست نداشتم ، از اون کتاب هایی بود که آخرش هیچ حسی نداشتم.
• داستان دوم اصلا جذاب نبود.
• داستان سوم هم دوست نداشتمش
خیلی کوتاه بود مثل یه خاطره . هیچ نقطه اوجی نداشت .
• داستان چهارم هیچ جزئیاتی نداشت و نویسنده فقط روایت کرده بود. ترجیح میدادم حداقل مدارکی که جیم ارائه کرد رو توصیف کنه.
• داستان پنجم دوست داشتنی تر بود نسبت به قبلی ها.
• داستان ششم واقعا جالب بود.
• داستان هفتم فقط ایده اش قشنگ بود
• داستان هشتم مجموعه ای از یادداشت های آدم هستش که میگه چجوری شد که سیب رو خوردن و ... به نظرم این داستان هم بامزه و سرگرم کننده بود.
• داستان نهم از همه طولانی تر و کامل تر بود راجع به عقب نشینی های مکرر عده ای در جنگ.
• داستان دهم یادداشت های حوا بود که به نظرم خیلی بامزه بود یه جاهایی .
ولی در کل این کتاب رو دوست نداشتم ، از اون کتاب هایی بود که آخرش هیچ حسی نداشتم.
April 23, 2023
I really hadn’t read Mark Twain since high school, where of course there was Huck and Jim on that raft floating significantly downriver. I had a teacher who was very full of the wisdom of Twain and the classic understanding of literature, and for taking it so seriously she was kind of notorious. I read Twain again, for the first time, recently, in the pages of A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, and was astounded to discover a humbug. Now, anyone who knows Oz knows a humbug is a pretender. That is how I find him in the pages of this collection, too.
I didn’t get into Hemingway until I was already an adult, and it’s really only been about less than a decade that I’ve plowed through much of his work, including last year, when I read his complete short stories, and Hemingway, I’m glad to say, is consistently enjoyable, a misunderstood “toxic masculinity” writer (to put him in the context that today’s world believes), who was fully attuned to and cognizant of the rich storytelling traditions he was inheriting and pushing precipitously forward. Like Melville before him, he would have discovered that the very engine that drove such interest in his work, the insatiable American appetite for the exotic, usually to be found in the fringes of society for which its readership otherwise has little patience, abhors any attempt to reach beyond it. Melville’s sin came in the form of a white whale; Hemingway turned himself into one, quite gleefully, the embodiment of a lost generation that shook loose everything the country was subsequently to label itself.
That’s not Twain. Twain, as it turns out, abhors only the vacuum, to which he constantly pitched his words in order to fill it, and for that ambition alone. He started out in newspapers, and for most of the good he exhibits here, he ought to have stayed in that disposable rabble. The depth of his imagination is as shallow as his understanding of literature itself, though his genius is that he can sometimes stumble into miracles his uncritical mind examines. To wit: the best stories here are the two series of extracts from the diaries of Adam and Eve. Twain understood not one iota of religion except as a civil institution that only got in his way, but he was truly amusing when hazarding how these progenitors might have seen each other, and on that score he is humorous indeed. And yet when he explores, say, the detective, before and after Sherlock Holmes (it’s fortunate that I read him last year, so I can appreciate how close and yet how so distantly Twain comes to capturing him), he ridicules and yet utterly fails in delegitimization by the sloppiest means possible.
Very little of this is comic. Not because it lacks Twain’s spoken delivery, but because it’s the product of a reactionary. It’s the result of that morbid interest of his readers to discover what the unwashed masses think. His account of the Civil War, his best efforts not to run away from it, are the stuff history usually affords exasperated generals. He never even comes close to apologizing for siding with the Confederacy; the thought never even occurs to him. I’m not condemning Twain’s prose because of this (social media abounds with this kind of sloppy justice), but it surely doesn’t help his case. His is the perspective of the marginalized. Sometimes, at least as far as how well Twain depicts it, there might be a good reason.
I’m not going to argue to henceforth erase Mark Twain from the literary record. Hardly! If anything, he’s the last representative of his era, having successfully survived the purges of his contemporaries, mostly thanks to the holy crusade to keep Huck Finn from being banned. These days it becomes increasingly fashionable to sanitize literature of the past for modern consumption, which is curious as it’s part and parcel with censorship, with the very idea of banning books, all of which Huck Finn has proudly stood in example against until this moment. The reports of irony being dead, after all, were greatly exaggerated.
It’s worth reading Twain, then, to get an idea of what life was like, then. And why we’re better off living here and now.
I didn’t get into Hemingway until I was already an adult, and it’s really only been about less than a decade that I’ve plowed through much of his work, including last year, when I read his complete short stories, and Hemingway, I’m glad to say, is consistently enjoyable, a misunderstood “toxic masculinity” writer (to put him in the context that today’s world believes), who was fully attuned to and cognizant of the rich storytelling traditions he was inheriting and pushing precipitously forward. Like Melville before him, he would have discovered that the very engine that drove such interest in his work, the insatiable American appetite for the exotic, usually to be found in the fringes of society for which its readership otherwise has little patience, abhors any attempt to reach beyond it. Melville’s sin came in the form of a white whale; Hemingway turned himself into one, quite gleefully, the embodiment of a lost generation that shook loose everything the country was subsequently to label itself.
That’s not Twain. Twain, as it turns out, abhors only the vacuum, to which he constantly pitched his words in order to fill it, and for that ambition alone. He started out in newspapers, and for most of the good he exhibits here, he ought to have stayed in that disposable rabble. The depth of his imagination is as shallow as his understanding of literature itself, though his genius is that he can sometimes stumble into miracles his uncritical mind examines. To wit: the best stories here are the two series of extracts from the diaries of Adam and Eve. Twain understood not one iota of religion except as a civil institution that only got in his way, but he was truly amusing when hazarding how these progenitors might have seen each other, and on that score he is humorous indeed. And yet when he explores, say, the detective, before and after Sherlock Holmes (it’s fortunate that I read him last year, so I can appreciate how close and yet how so distantly Twain comes to capturing him), he ridicules and yet utterly fails in delegitimization by the sloppiest means possible.
Very little of this is comic. Not because it lacks Twain’s spoken delivery, but because it’s the product of a reactionary. It’s the result of that morbid interest of his readers to discover what the unwashed masses think. His account of the Civil War, his best efforts not to run away from it, are the stuff history usually affords exasperated generals. He never even comes close to apologizing for siding with the Confederacy; the thought never even occurs to him. I’m not condemning Twain’s prose because of this (social media abounds with this kind of sloppy justice), but it surely doesn’t help his case. His is the perspective of the marginalized. Sometimes, at least as far as how well Twain depicts it, there might be a good reason.
I’m not going to argue to henceforth erase Mark Twain from the literary record. Hardly! If anything, he’s the last representative of his era, having successfully survived the purges of his contemporaries, mostly thanks to the holy crusade to keep Huck Finn from being banned. These days it becomes increasingly fashionable to sanitize literature of the past for modern consumption, which is curious as it’s part and parcel with censorship, with the very idea of banning books, all of which Huck Finn has proudly stood in example against until this moment. The reports of irony being dead, after all, were greatly exaggerated.
It’s worth reading Twain, then, to get an idea of what life was like, then. And why we’re better off living here and now.
December 17, 2020
No, perdón. Me aburrió muchísimo.
October 7, 2016
I had never really read Mark Twain before this compilation, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. His sense of humor struck me very hilariously many, many times throughout my reading. I have an appreciation for his depth of dry humor mixed with some very exaggerated elements that almost feel like hyperbole and are just extremely funny. Just how he will almost casually put something in there, maybe in a character's conversation, with a certain wording, overtone or undertone, that just makes it hilarious to me. I also felt that a lot of his ideas had such a strong originality that I often was led to think that many of his themes or ideas I have never heard of before, even remotely, as far as a comparison to something else thematically. I can definitely see why his writing was so popular, and so well-loved. Some specific highlights for me were the McWilliamses stories.
August 9, 2007
Perfect!
Read
November 22, 2018Uhm, I don't think the compilation of Twain's short stories work for me. I had a hard time enjoying it.
Mark Twain's works agree with me when they're translated to Bahasa. I read Tom Sawyer in Indonesian and enjoyed it immensely.
.
After some time, I read Huckleberry Finn and The Prince and the Pauper in English. I could still get into them, but not much. I guess the English confused me or something, esp Prince and Pauper. It's hard.
.
Twain's big name still fascinates me. So I bought his short stories book. I've read some of the stories, but again, I failed to enjoy them. At the same time I was also reading Oscar Wilde's stories, and frankly I very much enjoy Wilde's. Much more understandable (for me, again this is from personal experience and opinion).
Mark Twain's works agree with me when they're translated to Bahasa. I read Tom Sawyer in Indonesian and enjoyed it immensely.
.
After some time, I read Huckleberry Finn and The Prince and the Pauper in English. I could still get into them, but not much. I guess the English confused me or something, esp Prince and Pauper. It's hard.
.
Twain's big name still fascinates me. So I bought his short stories book. I've read some of the stories, but again, I failed to enjoy them. At the same time I was also reading Oscar Wilde's stories, and frankly I very much enjoy Wilde's. Much more understandable (for me, again this is from personal experience and opinion).
May 30, 2018
So many inventive plots. Twain's writing has an awesome way of saying something mundane in a completely original and creative way. I wanted to write down and save so many of these, but it would have gotten out of hand as he can generate them in abundance.
December 21, 2018
Deserving of all accolades.
April 22, 2021
۳/۵ ستاره
مجموعه داستانی از مارک تواین با تمی طنز گونه.
مجموعه داستانی از مارک تواین با تمی طنز گونه.
March 7, 2022
Twain knew how to write and write well. Review subject to cancellation!
June 19, 2024
Mark Twain the man that you were
Want to read
October 18, 2025Read so far--
The notorious jumping frog of Calaveras County --2
The story of the bad little boy --
*Cannibalism in the cars --
Niagara --
The Capitoline Venus --
*Journalism in Tennessee --
*A curious dream --
The facts in the great beef contract --
How I edited an agricultural paper --
A medieval romance --3
My watch --3
Political economy --
Science vs. luck --
The story of the good little boy --
A mysterious visit --
Buck Fanshaw's funeral --
Captain Ned Blakely --
His grandfather's old ram --
Dick Baker's cat --
A letter from Horace Greeley --
*A true story --
The experience of the McWilliamses with membranous croup --
Mrs. McWilliams and the lightning --
The McWilliamses and the burglar alarm --
*The facts concerning the recent carnival of crime in Connecticut --
The canvasser's tale --
The loves of Alonzo Fitz Clarence and Rosannah Ethelton --
Edward Mills and George Benton, a tale --
*Jim Baker's bluejay yarn --
The man who put up at Gadsby's --
A curious experience --
*The invalid's story --
The stolen white elephant --3
A dying man's confession --
The professor's yarn --
A burning brand --
The private history of a campaign that failed --2
A ghost story --2
Luck --2
Playing courier --
*The Californian's tale --
An extract from Adam's diary --
*Eve's diary --
The Esquimau maiden's romance --
Is he living or is he dead? --2
*The £1,000,000 bank-note --
John Brown and Mary Taylor --
Cecil Rhodes and the shark --
Why Ed Jackson called on Commodore Vanderbilt --
The man that corrupted Hadleyburg --3
Death disk --
Two little tales --
*The belated Russian passport --
A double-barreled detective story --
Five boons of life --
Was it heaven? or hell? --3
A dog's tale --
A horse's tale --
The $30,000 bequest --
The war prayer --
Hunting the deceitful turkey --
An extract from Captain Stormfield's visit to heaven --2
A fable --
How to tell a story --
***
*My platonic sweetheart --
*What stumped the blue jays --
*A literary nightmare --
A thumbprint and what came of it --3
*Lucretia Smith's soldier --
*Sold to Satan --
The notorious jumping frog of Calaveras County --2
The story of the bad little boy --
*Cannibalism in the cars --
Niagara --
The Capitoline Venus --
*Journalism in Tennessee --
*A curious dream --
The facts in the great beef contract --
How I edited an agricultural paper --
A medieval romance --3
My watch --3
Political economy --
Science vs. luck --
The story of the good little boy --
A mysterious visit --
Buck Fanshaw's funeral --
Captain Ned Blakely --
His grandfather's old ram --
Dick Baker's cat --
A letter from Horace Greeley --
*A true story --
The experience of the McWilliamses with membranous croup --
Mrs. McWilliams and the lightning --
The McWilliamses and the burglar alarm --
*The facts concerning the recent carnival of crime in Connecticut --
The canvasser's tale --
The loves of Alonzo Fitz Clarence and Rosannah Ethelton --
Edward Mills and George Benton, a tale --
*Jim Baker's bluejay yarn --
The man who put up at Gadsby's --
A curious experience --
*The invalid's story --
The stolen white elephant --3
A dying man's confession --
The professor's yarn --
A burning brand --
The private history of a campaign that failed --2
A ghost story --2
Luck --2
Playing courier --
*The Californian's tale --
An extract from Adam's diary --
*Eve's diary --
The Esquimau maiden's romance --
Is he living or is he dead? --2
*The £1,000,000 bank-note --
John Brown and Mary Taylor --
Cecil Rhodes and the shark --
Why Ed Jackson called on Commodore Vanderbilt --
The man that corrupted Hadleyburg --3
Death disk --
Two little tales --
*The belated Russian passport --
A double-barreled detective story --
Five boons of life --
Was it heaven? or hell? --3
A dog's tale --
A horse's tale --
The $30,000 bequest --
The war prayer --
Hunting the deceitful turkey --
An extract from Captain Stormfield's visit to heaven --2
A fable --
How to tell a story --
***
*My platonic sweetheart --
*What stumped the blue jays --
*A literary nightmare --
A thumbprint and what came of it --3
*Lucretia Smith's soldier --
*Sold to Satan --
June 5, 2025
I like the Twain-esque wit of these stories. Mark Twain is a keen observer and knows how to tell a story. However, when you read tens of stories of the same witty bandwidth, it gets repetitive too quickly. This edition may be a valuable piece to have quintessential Twain stories all in one place but I felt that the book could
have done without half of the stories and it would still have the very same gist and be more attractive to people who'd read Twain for the first time.
have done without half of the stories and it would still have the very same gist and be more attractive to people who'd read Twain for the first time.
July 17, 2013
What I liked about it: Much like myself, Twain was a natural skeptic with a sense of humour so dry it cracked in several places (cynical people might call us 'sarcastic'), and that comes out in his stories. It's also pretty clear that he was disgusted by the morality tales of his day, in which good little children are rewarded by the universe and bad little children are punished, as evidenced by 'The Story of the Bad Little Boy' and 'The Story of the Good Little Boy' in which the opposite happens. He also has the measure of human nature, with several tales of people and even entire towns corrupted by wealth or the promise thereof.
What I didn't like about it: Much as Twain might have disliked the sentimental morality tales of children, he wasn't above telling them about animals. 'A Horse's Tale' is a fable about a noble but abused horse and is the same sappy claptrap he was skewering in his stories about good children being punished.
omnibrowbooks.blogspot.com
What I didn't like about it: Much as Twain might have disliked the sentimental morality tales of children, he wasn't above telling them about animals. 'A Horse's Tale' is a fable about a noble but abused horse and is the same sappy claptrap he was skewering in his stories about good children being punished.
omnibrowbooks.blogspot.com
October 10, 2011
As the short story wasn't Twain's metier, these sketches, fables, tall tales and sentimental fiction won't make anyone forget Poe and Hawthorne. Yet Twain was a born storyteller. "The Invalid's Story," about a man in a train's baggage car who mistakes a shipment of Limburger cheese for a rotting corpse, is a jaw-dropper. So is the scathing "The Man Who Corrupted Hadleyburg," which takes aim at human folly and scores a bull's-eye.
April 23, 2008
I always loved Huckelberry Finn and Tom Sawyer, and Life on the Mississippi, I never knew he wrote other books. I loved reading these books from one of my favorite authors. There is a humorous side to them that will keep you laughing and unable to put it down.
May 11, 2009
Full of humor and wisdom. I don't know how to begin with this book. Halfway done. I used to read a story a night, and during that time the whole world was full of irony and humor. They say an apple a day keeps the doctor away, well I say a dose of Twain a day keeps the therapist away. Hoho.
September 19, 2007
i love the stories about Adam and Eve at Niagra Falls, and the one about the bullfrog jumping contest.
February 26, 2017
Super great. Twain is a treasure.
October 19, 2011
There needs to be a category for "partially read." I didn't make it through all these stories. Many were enjoyable, but apparently I need a unifying plot to keep me reading.
September 13, 2010
Hilarious and dark at the same time. "Jim Baker's Bluejay Yarn" was probably my favorite.
August 20, 2012
I had a dictionary at my side the whole time I was reading this, but it was worth it.
January 14, 2013
What can I say? It's Twain and absolutely hilarious at times.
March 27, 2013
four and a half
Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews