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The Washington Post - Dennis Drabelle

In the wake of two excellent Twain biographies published in the aughts—Ron Powers's Mark Twain: A Life and Fred Kaplan's The Singular Mark Twain—Jerome Loving had a lot of nerve to undertake yet another. But Loving's Mark Twain not only holds its own with those predecessors; in some ways, it surpasses them. Concision is one such way. Whereas both Powers and Kaplan take over 600 pages to bag their man, Loving gets the job done in under 500. Never losing sight of the main reason we want to read about Twain—his literary genius—Loving brings some unjustly neglected works to the reader's attention.

Publishers Weekly

In the latest volume for the centennial of Twain's death, Loving (Walt Whitman: Song of Himself) serves up a balanced literary biography of a crowded life—“to renew our acquaintance with this familiar stranger in our literature and culture.” Many of the best chapters include sensitive appraisals of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson, and the anonymously published Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc, with The Adventures of Tom Sawyer put in a different context as possibly the most overrated work of American fiction when considered as adult literature. In fact, this Mark Twain flows with the easy familiarity of a scholar who has spent a lifetime tracking 19th-century American literature. Of certain interest is the discussion, at various points, of Twain's complex views on blacks and slavery, Native Americans, the Chinese, and—particularly from the standpoint of his home in fin-de-siècle Vienna—on Jews. If this biography of Clemens's many adventures fails to delve “psychologically” into the writer's family and other relationships, it is a solid contribution to literary interpretation of the man who infused American literature with what has been called “tragic laughter.” 37 b&w photos. (Apr.)

Library Journal

Decades ago Bernard DeVoto wrote that Mark Twain's humor promoted tragic laughter. Twain preferred to be known as a serious writer rather than a humorist. When Twain was on the lecture circuit, however, it was his humor that produced the crowds and the money. Before the mass appeal of his writings and his lectures (both earlier and later), Twain worked as a printer, a river pilot for four years, a newspaper reporter, and a travel writer. Many of these "adventures" are recorded in this new work by Loving (English, Texas A&M University), a scholar of 19th-century American literature. His focus is the man and the writer, not exactly a new approach. However, Loving's use of new material reveals more of the emotional element in Twain's writing and the personal travails of his peripatetic life. VERDICT Perhaps the most respected Twain biographer is Henry Nash Smith. But Loving's new work sheds additional light on this enigmatic, enduring icon of dark and sometimes tragic laughter.—Robert Kelly, Fort Wayne Community Schs., IN

• Table of Contents

Table of Contents