Mark TWAIN (TWAIN Mark)

Born in Florida, Missouri. In the town of Hannibal on the Mississippi, the future of St. Petersburg's most famous book, Twain's "Adventures of Tom Sawyer" (1876) and "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" (1884), the family of Judge Clemens moved when the future writer was four years. Cruising childhood experiences nurtured creativity Twain almost to the end of his literary activity.

Alias, which in 1863 signed newspaper articles, and then works of art, reminiscent of his youth, when Twain was a pilot on river steamers (twain "a dozen yards, t. e. sufficient depth). With twelve years Twain had to work: student typesetter, journalist provincial newspapers, a prospector in Nevada. He was self-taught, . life felt the shortcomings of education, . did not prevent him to create a novel study of "Personal recollections of Joan of Arc" (1896), . demanded hard work on historical sources, . and the novel "The Mysterious Stranger" (published in 1916), . affected the most complicated philosophical perspective,
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Twain was a literary school newspaper, and his favorite genre for a long time remained a satirical sketch, a comic sketch, Humoresque, often using the moves and techniques of narration, typical folklore. Played a special role in the formation of Twain's folklore, created the "frontier" (moving west border, beyond which lay the territory, which have not yet reached civilization). "Frontier" in the childhood years Twain was Hannibal, at the time of his youth, Nevada and California, which came to him the glory of an outstanding journalist and coryphaeus humor

. Since the textbook story "The famous leaping frog of Calaveras" (1865) defined creative features, . remaining in the early sketch books Twain (Innocents Abroad ", . 1869, . "Traveling light", . 1872, . "Life on the Mississippi, . 1883); home of these features - humor, . understood as' the ability to make people laugh, . maintaining full seriousness ",
. Incarnate in "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" and the philosophical fairy tale "The Prince and the Pauper" (1882) Twain's ideal - freedom from all conventional and lifeless - answered the frame of mind, . prevalent in contemporary America, . ready to admit to their national genius of Mark Twain,
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However, his reputation began to change with the release of a book about Huck Finn, which incorporated the tragic episodes in which the young heroes called real everydayness backwater with his feeble mind and self-interest. After moving from California in 1870 in Hartford, Twain is constantly in contact with the world of industrialists and businessmen, to whom, after his marriage he was involved.

Writer penetrated more undisguised disgust for "gilded Age", as it was called then-era of rapid economic growth, accompanied by rampant corruption. Hence - a bitter satire A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court "(1889), the story" patsy Wilson "(1896), pamphlets and satirical stories of the same period. Growing misanthropy Twain, . monument which left many times they remade "The Mysterious Stranger", . partly due to the fact, . that failed business ventures led him in 1894 to bankruptcy, . therefore he had for the money to make the exhausting trip with the reading of his stories, . and then a world tour, . described in the book of essays "On the equator" (1897),
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In the last years of his life Twain's less and less was taken up the pen, but frequently gave lectures, which always appeared in a white flannel suit (this suit was, as it were an integral part of its image). In 1907, Twain was awarded an honorary doctoral degree from Oxford University. Until his death, Twain worked on his autobiography, which has not had time to complete, however, in 1924 Autobiography of Mark Twain, to complete his secretary, Albert Payne, nevertheless saw the light. In 1990, in Hollywood, was found the first part of the manuscript of "Huckleberry Finn". Six years later this novel was finally published in the form in which it intended to release the author.