7 August 1884 • Elmira, N.Y. (MS, in pencil: MH-H, UCCL 01537)
I have no doubt I am doing a most criminal & outrageous thing—for I am sending you these infernal Huck Finn proofs—but the very last vestige of my patience has gone to the devil, & I cannot bear the sight of another slip of them. My hair turns white with rage, at sight of the mere outside of the package; & this time I didn’t even try to glance inside it, but re-enveloped it at once, & directed it to you. Now you’re not to read it unless you really don’t mind it—you’re only to re-ship it to Webster & tell him, from me, to read the remnant of the book himself, & send no more slips to me meⒶemendation , . under any circumstances. Will you?
Blackguard me if you want to—I deserve it.
P. S. Come, brace up, now, & prepare yourself for criticism. You know Miss Wolcott. Well, she & Mrs. Gleason came up from the Water Cure at eventide, & Miss W. got to talking about peculiar people ◊◊◊ in that museum of invalids down there, & finally quoted this remark from a woman patient who sets herself up for a 4,000-candle-power intellectual light:
“Wal, I like Shakspeare, & I reckon I can go so far as to say there’s none that likes him better or appreciates him higher than what I do; but as for James, & Howells & Walt Whitman & Swinburne, they’re all alike—when you’ve read one, you’ve read ’em all!”
Isn’t that uncreateable?—has to come natural, an edifice like that—can’t be planned & built by art. I contend that there was one more name in that list, but as all the household say no, I yield to the majority.
The daughter of Sam Medary (wasn’t that the name of that Columbus editor?) was here some time ago, & when this said young lady heard of you for the first time, from Miss Wolcott, she was deeply gratified to know that Col her native town had produced an author, & said she would get one of your books & read it if Miss Wolcott would furnish her the name of one.
Which reminds me that Gerhardt is here, making a bust of me, & the other day in New York he went into a place near Wallack’s, where there was a vast outlay of actressesⒶemendation photographs on sale, & asked for a photo of Mark Twain.
“What name did you say, ?” please?”
“Mark Twain.”
Reflective pause—struggle with memory. Then:
“Where does she play?”
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
- MTHL. Mark Twain–Howells Letters. Edited by Henry Nash Smith and William M. Gibson, with the assistance of Frederick Anderson. 2 vols. Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. 1960
MS, in pencil, MH-H.
MTHL, 2:497–99.
see Howells Letters in Description of Provenanceclick to open link.