I am researching two questions – one concerning who exactly Howells is and also when Mark Twain gave his next speech. I found my answer to the first question with a quick google search, but the Mark Twain Project also provided some interesting insight into both his relationship with Howell and how he handled the fallout from the speech. Although it seems other people in the class have found that he didn’t face the universal rejection he describes in the typescript, his letter to Howells dated December 23, 1877 (link: http://www.marktwainproject.org/xtf/view?docId=letters/UCCL02520.xml;query=%20howells;searchAll=;sectionType1=;sectionType2=;sectionType3=;sectionType4=;sectionType5=;doc.view=text_note_comm;style=letter;brand=mtp#1)
is consistent with the shame he described in the autobiography:
My sense of disgrace does not abate. It grows. I see that it is going to add itself to my list of permannencies—a list of humiliations that extends back to when I was seven years old, & which keep on persecuting me regardless of my repentancies.
If he did exaggerate the reception in his autobiography, it appears he wasn’t aware of the fact that not everyone thought it was horrific or insulting. There was the possibility he didn’t describe the situation in the autobiography accurately so as to draw sympathy, or for entertainment value, but it seems unlikely in light of how described it in his personal correspondence. Interestingly, it appears (link: http://www.twainquotes.com/SpeechIndex.html) that a little over a month later he delivered a speech. For all of the personal embarrassment he faced, it’s remarkable he was willing to trust himself to deliver a speech so soon.
3 comments:
Perhaps Howells' letter to Twain after the incident brought Twain hope so that he felt less guilty and was able to deliver another speech in public so soon.
"So, all in a moment, his world had come to an end--as it seemed. But Howells's letter, which came rushing back by first mail, brought hope. Howells declared that there was no intention of dropping Mark Twain's work from the Atlantic." (http://www.humanitiesweb.org/human.php?s=s&p=l&ID=122)
I also wonder how it is that Twain's two accounts of the event, one in his Autobiography and another in a letter to Howells, 28 years apart, both exaggerate the facts. Perhaps Twain did not lie, but truly felt ashamed by his speech, despite evidence that it did not go over as badly as he thought. Has anyone found any evidence not from Twain himself that Twain's speech offended the crowd?
He gave a speech only a month later? I think this shows that his speech was not at all vulgar - he definitely exaggerated his account. The way he worded his Autobiography would imply that he would almost never give a public speech again. Thanks for this research - combined with other people's research I can surely say that Mark Twain completely exaggerated this account.
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