This volume collects a variety of new, classic, and contemporary essays on Twain's life and works. The introduction offers a reflection on the author's enduring popularity and praises Twain's skillful re-creation of an authentic American vernacular in "Jim Smiley and His Jumping Frog" and Huckleberry Finn. Other essays offer an analysis of two of Twain's travel books, Innocents Abroad and Roughing It, a discussion of the darker side of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and a three-part discussion of structure, themes, humor, and the treatment of race in Huckleberry Finn.

Career, life, and influence. --On Mark Twain / -- Biography of Mark Twain / -- The Paris review perspective / -- Critical contexts. -- Mark Twain and his times / -- Mark Twain's critical reception / -- "Pluck enough to lynch a man": Mark Twain and manhood / -- Kindred rivals: Mark Twain and Ambrose Bierce / -- Critical readings. -- Mark Twain as a travel writer / -- The adventures of Tom Sawyer: a nightmare vision of American boyhood / -- The realism of Huckleberry Finn / -- "Huckleberry fun" / -- Huck, Jim, and American racial discourse / -- Connecticut Yankee: Twain's other masterpiece / -- Mark Twain as a science-fiction writer / -- Mark Twain and the tradition of literary domesticity / Michael J. Kiskis. On Mark Twain -- Biography of Mark Twain -- The Paris review perspective -- Critical contexts -- Mark Twain and his times -- Mark Twain's critical reception -- "Pluck enough to lynch a man": Mark Twain and manhood -- Kindred rivals: Mark Twain and Ambrose Bierce -- Mark Twain as a travel writer -- The adventures of Tom Sawyer: a nightmare vision of American boyhood -- The realism of Huckleberry Finn -- "Huckleberry fun" -- Huck, Jim, and American racial discourse -- Connecticut Yankee: Twain's other masterpiece -- Mark Twain as a science-fiction writer -- Mark Twain and the tradition of literary domesticity.