Content area
Full text
Mark Twain, American Humorist Tracy Wuster. University of Missouri Press, 2016.
President of the American Humor Studies Association and editor of its journal, Studies in American Humor, Tracy Wuster focuses on Mark Twain's transitional years, 1865-1882, and his well-earned acclaim as "the most popular humorist who ever lived" (355). Released as part of the "Mark Twain and His Circle" series, this work will appeal to Mark Twain enthusiasts as well as to a general reading audience. Wuster identifies four stages in Mark Twain's reputation: the first characterized "by his appearance as a newspaper reporter, magazinist, and lecturer in California-'the Wild Humorist of the Pacific Slope,' which culminated in the success of his jumping frog" (356); the second, marked by ascension to national and international fame as American Humorist and central exponent of national humor as "the best of second-rate humorists"; the third, a time of tension between "mass success and literary respectability... 'quite worthy of the company of the best'" (356); and a final stage following A Tramp Abroad and The Prince and the Pauper in which his work was assessed in terms of his own earlier work and during which he gained Willian Dean Howells's resounding commendation as "the most popular humorist who ever lived" (356). Ever mindful of the tensions between an Arnoldian "high culture in America" and popular "mass success," the author evaluates Twain's humor as having its own unique and lasting values apart from its consideration as "serious" literature or its assignment to the critical oblivion of "humorist works that fade along with their historical context" (372). Wuster raises Twain prominently to his rightful place as "icon of American Humor..., the central figure of what American humor had been and what it might become" (372).
In a carefully laid...