Samuel L. Clemens to James R. Osgood, 16 August 1875 · Newport, R.I

Source: Harvard University, Houghton Library, Cambridge, Mass ([MH-H])

Cue: "You see, per"

Source format: "MS"

Letter type: "[standard letter]"

Notes:

Last modified:

Revision History: AB

Published on MTPO: 2007

Print Publication: v6

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MTPDocEd

To James R. Osgood
16 August 1875 • Newport, R.I. (MS: MH-H, UCCL 01257)

slc/mt

Bateman’s,

Newport, 16th.

My Dear Osgood:

You see, per enclosed, that Gill, the infernal thief, is still advertising my name in his book. How is this?1explanatory note

Yrs Truly

S. L. Clemens

Textual Commentary

16 August 1875 • To James R. Osgood • Newport, R.I. • UCCL 01257

Source text(s):

MS, Rogers Memorial Room, Houghton Library, Harvard University (MH-H).

Previous Publication:

L6 , 524–525.

Provenance:

The Henry M. Rogers and Kathleen Rogers Collection was donated in 1930.

More information on provenance may be found in Description of Provenanceclick to open link.

Explanatory Notes

The advertisement that Clemens enclosed has not been identified, but it was no doubt similar to the one in Publishers’ Weekly for 14 August (“Valuable Books,” 8:348):

The Treasure Trove Series. The Choicest Humor by the great writers. Edited by R. H. Stoddard. Vol. i, Burlesque. Comprising the choicest humor of Charles Dickens, Mark Twain, G. W. Curtis, Arthur Sketchley, F. C. Burnand, Charles Lamb, Washington Irving, and others. Cloth, Square 16mo, $1.

The agreement that Gill had reached with Osgood’s lawyers permitted him to offer for sale the two thousand copies of Burlesque containing Clemens’s sketch, but it evidently prohibited him from advertising his name (23 July 75 to Osgood, n. 3). “Arthur Sketchley” was the pseudonym of George Rose (1817–82), an English dramatist and humorist whose numerous sketches expressed the views of an illiterate old woman called “Mrs. Brown.” Burnand was an English humorist and contributor to Punch whom Clemens had met in 1873 ( L5 , 532–33).

References

Harvard University, Houghton Library, Cambridge, Mass.
Machlis, Paul, ed. Union Catalog of Clemens Letters. Edited by Paul Machlis. Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press. [In some cases, UCCL catalog numbers cited in this volume supersede those assigned in 1986 and reflect corrections or additions to the catalog since publication. An updated version of the catalog can be consulted via the Letters Search page at MTPO.] 1986
SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). Mark Twain’s Letters, Volume 6: 1874–1875. Edited by Michael B. Frank and Harriet Elinor Smith. The Mark Twain Papers. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. Also online at MTPO[bib32371]. 2002
SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). Mark Twain’s Letters, Volume 5: 1872–1873. Edited by Lin Salamo and Harriet Elinor Smith. The Mark Twain Papers. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. Also online at MTPO[bib32371]. 1997

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