Review: Mark Twain: Baiting the Masters
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 09 30, 2012
As a longtime fan of Mark Twain's writing, I was surprised to see this title,On Masturbation, appearing here. I was puzzled, thinking that it might be some unusual parody similar to what we've seen appear recently on certain bestsellers dealing with multiple shades of grey. You never know these days.But I was wrong, as this is actually a reprint of a speech that the witty and ever- irreverent lecturer and author Samuel Clemens, known more popularly by his pen name Mark Twain, did indeed deliver one evening in Paris in 1879. The Stomach Club, a group of American writers and artists, had gathered to drink, to eat a good dinner, and hear an address by Mark Twain.  He was among friends and, according to the custom of the club, he delivered a humorous talk on a subject hardly ever mentioned in public in that day and age.  The title of his lecture was "Some Thoughts on the Science of Onanism," and it was one of the most controversial that he ever delivered.During his short but hilarious speech, Mark Twain offered some fictitious quotes from a wide array of masterful personages. He quotes Homer in the second book of the Iliad, Caesar in his Commentaries, Charles Darwin, Brigham Young, and even Benjamin Franklin, to name a few.  In this book, these are interspaced with about thirty excellent black & white vintage illustrations to match the quotes. The introduction by authorSam Torodesets the pace, with his observation that Twain "demonstrated his complete mastery of the subject at hand.After the meeting, he preserved the manuscript among his papers, but Mark Twain's remarks rubbed Victorian society the wrong way, and were censored for quite a few years. The lecture was not published until 1943, and then only in a limited edition of fifty copies.To those who have read his works, it should be no surprise that Samuel Clemens had an impressive array of words, and he knew well how to use them. With dozens of novels and hundreds of other written works, Twain had a remarkable vocabulary. He could be quite eloquent, endearing him to the literati of his time, yet his writing could also express the language of the lowest echelons of society. His characters inAdventures of Huckleberry Finnexhibit his wonderful grasp of everyday terms and rough dialects of his time, so it should not come as a shock that this celebrated author could occasionally have a bit of a potty mouth.If he were alive today, one could only imagine the expression on Twain's face as he puffed on his pipe and listened to theEvery Sperm Is Sacredtrack by Monty Python.Mark Twain's renamedOn Masturbationis a short book, about 38 pages in this Kindle edition, and for those who prefer a paperback version, it's available as well. Whichever one you choose, you'll gain a greater insight to the amazing wit that this favorite author possessed whenever he whipped out his satirical pen.9/30/2012