Mark Twain, Travel Books, and Tourism

Mark Twain, Travel Books, and Tourism
Author: Jeffrey Alan Melton
Publisher: University of Alabama Press
Total Pages: 220
Release: 2002-06-26
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0817311602

Grounding this study in tourist theory, Melton explores how, in five travel books, Twain captures the birth and growth of a new creature who would go on to change the map of the world: the American tourist."--BOOK JACKET.

American Vandal

American Vandal
Author: Roy Morris Jr.
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 288
Release: 2015-03-10
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 0674425340

For a man who liked being called the American, Mark Twain spent a surprising amount of time outside the continental United States. Biographer Roy Morris, Jr., focuses on the dozen years Twain spent overseas and on the popular travel books—The Innocents Abroad, A Tramp Abroad, and Following the Equator—he wrote about his adventures. Unintimidated by Old World sophistication and unafraid to travel to less developed parts of the globe, Twain encouraged American readers to follow him around the world at the dawn of mass tourism, when advances in transportation made leisure travel possible for an emerging middle class. In so doing, he helped lead Americans into the twentieth century and guided them toward more cosmopolitan views. In his first book, The Innocents Abroad (1869), Twain introduced readers to the “American Vandal,” a brash, unapologetic visitor to foreign lands, unimpressed with the local ambiance but eager to appropriate any souvenir that could be carried off. He adopted this persona throughout his career, even after he grew into an international celebrity who dined with the German Kaiser, traded quips with the king of England, gossiped with the Austrian emperor, and negotiated with the president of Transvaal for the release of war prisoners. American Vandal presents an unfamiliar Twain: not the bred-in-the-bone Midwesterner we associate with Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer but a global citizen whose exposure to other peoples and places influenced his evolving positions on race, war, and imperialism, as both he and America emerged on the world stage.

Mark Twain's Travel Literature

Mark Twain's Travel Literature
Author: Harold H. Hellwig
Publisher: McFarland
Total Pages: 228
Release: 2008-03-19
Genre: History
ISBN: 0786436514

This critical study analyzes major concepts in the travel literature of Mark Twain and notes how his oeuvre (including his classic works of fiction) revolves around travel as a central issue. The book focuses especially on his representations of time, place, and identity in the travel works Roughing It, A Tramp Abroad, The Innocents Abroad, Life on The Mississippi, and Following the Equator. All receive an in-depth analysis, noting Twain's strong sense of nostalgia for the disappearing American frontier, his growing concern over the assimilation of Native American cultures, and his continual search for a sense of personal and national identity. One appendix provides a complete list of the travel literature contained in Twain's personal library.

A Tramp Abroad

A Tramp Abroad
Author: Mark Twain
Publisher: Courier Corporation
Total Pages: 342
Release: 2012-03-13
Genre: Literary Collections
ISBN: 0486117111

Successor to Twain's first collection of travel memoirs takes a second look at Europe. This time, his amusement bears a more cynical cast, as he sees the sights through older and more experienced eyes.