Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1925-03-24
NEW BOOKS
AT RANDOM
MARK TwATN's AUTOBIOGRAPHY.
Harper and Brothers.
/. G.. nj.


that IL can't be done-that no man
can write his own life nor that of
another. For life Is not words, not
deeds even. II is, instead that deep
seated, exclusive. personal possession
of daily existence-thought and
feelings, desires and dreams, a thing
OF heroic panoramic projection and
of woefully meager fulfillment. Above
all. IL is a jealousy guarded secret
which, not for the world. would one
deliver over even to the cool scrutiny
of his own physical senses. much less
to the forum Of a general accounting
and judgment. Acts and words are
but the thin crust of his world with
Its scattered snow SUBMITS and its
vacant wastes of water"-so trifing
a part of him. Biographies are but
coats and buttons, the straps and
strings of the man himself.
Having decided-and in good rea-
son, too, 1t seems-that the thing
can't be done. Mark Twain casts
about for some means of achieving
the impossible.
4 i i <
1t was over in Florence-somethi &
like 20 years ago that he hit upon
& scheme by way of which, If at all
an autobiography might be produced
Start at no particular time of your
life; wander at your free will all
over it; talk only about THE thing
which interests you for the momen
drop it the moment its intere.
threatens to pale, and turn your talk
upon the new and interesting thing
that has come into your mind mean
while" Combine the diary and the
autobiography. The former insures
vivid effects and serves. besides. as
groundwork for contrasts Of similar
things lying further back in the past
And. so, I have found the right
plan"-one that turns labor into
the method of Mark Twain's autobi-
ography-an inspired one you will
say upon testing it.
y n u x
In pursuance of this plan Mark
Twain sets out with no more than g
nod of recognition to the self-evident
fact of his having been born. with
no more than a passing gesture OF
greeting TO the time sequence with
which the common run of biograph-
ers are so exclusively concerned. in
deed, save for a curt bow by way OF
introducing himself, one might in
the beginning surmtse this to be the
story of Gen. Grant, to whom Mark
Twain gives many pages of recollec-
ton, many words of unqualified APP
probation and homage. And by way
OF these Gen. Grant stands alive in
many an intimate disclosure that we
are the richer for sharing here. Then
others come trooping through the
mind OF this handsome white-fian
neled man with the shaggy name
who PAGES the veranda back and
forth talking himself out to Albert
~
peal in rounding up for print these
ranging and vivid pictures of the
past. A fine company marches by
notable people about whom curiosity
is always keen and not easily salts
fed. Now and then these personal
contacts give way to little soliloquies
upon-say, the character of man, the
effects of age, the beauties of the
German language, grammar, whatnot
The matter of little account, the
manner of prime Importance. Friend
ly sketches, all. yet never of thai
spurious friendliness that sacrifices
the truth for undiscriminating and
worthless praise.
\ = = x
OF all the interesting and out
standing people honored here with
the uniquely distinctive considera-
ton of Mark Twain. none is more
interesting than this one, or that
who stands as the creation of his
own brain Col. Seekers, Tom Sawyer
Huckelberry Finn-nobody could be
more in our hearts than these. Not
any prince or botentate whatever
And we read here in amazement that
Is years ago Tom Sawyer and Huck-
leberry Finn were flung out of the
Concord Public Library as books
likely to have a bad effect on chill
dren. AT the January meeting II
was decided not to place Huck and
Tom in the children's rooms, where
Little Nellie's Silver Mine anc
Dotty Dimple at Home were setting
the pace for those rooms" Then the
children took the matter up with
such floods of protesting letters that
the wise elders were quite powerless
TO stem the tide. Children know
They always have. They always will
if the old folks will let them alone.
- II y
And Col Sellers-God bless him,
Hear Mark Twain himself talk about
the colonel. Many persons regarded
Col. Sellers as fiction, an in
vention, an extravagant' Impossible
ity. and did me the honor to call
him Creation; but they were mis-
taken. 1 merely put him on paper as
he was: he was not a person who
could be exaggerated. The incidents
which looked most extravagart, both
in the book and on the stage, were
not inventions of mine, but were
fact OF his life" Col. Sellers was
my mothers favorite cousin, James
hampton and James Lamp
ton foated. all his days in a tinted
mist of magnificent dreams, and died
at last without seeing one of them
realized. / saw him last in 1884,
when it had been 26 years since
ate the basin of raw turnips and
washed them down with a bucket of
water in his house. He was become
old and white-headed, but he was all
there yet-not a detail wanting; the
happy light in his eye, the Astounding
hope in his heart, the persuasive
tongue, the Misunderstanding imagi-
nation-all there. And before could
turn around he was polishing UP his
Aladdin's lamp and flashing the Sc
cret riches of the world before me-"
And he began to tell Twain about a
small venture" that he had in New
Mexico through his son-"only a lit
tie thing-a mere triie-partly to
amuse my leisure, partly to keep my
capital from lying idle, but mainly
to develop the boy. Fortunes wheel
is ever revolving; he may have to
work for his living some day. A
mere trif1e." And so it was, Twain
says, "as he began 1t. But under his
deft hands it grew and blossomed
and spread-oh, beyond ina gina
ton" And again, Yes. it's but a
trifie S things go nowadays-but
amusing. 1t passes the time. The
boy thinks great things of it, but he
is young, you knoV, and magma
tive: lacks the experience which
comes of handling large affairs, and
which tempers the fancy and per-
fects the judgment. I suppose there's
a couple of millions in it, possibly
three, but not more, I think; still for
boy, you know, just starting in
life it is not bad / should not want
him to make a fortune-let that