About the Book
Longtime admirers of Mark Twain are aware of how integral animals were to his work as a writer, from his first stories through his final years, including many pieces that were left unpublished at his death. This beautiful volume, illustrated with 30 new images by master engraver Barry Moser, gathers writings from the full span of Mark Twain’s career and elucidates his special attachment to and regard for animals. What may surprise even longtime readers and fans is that Twain was an early and ardent animal welfare advocate, the most prominent American of his day to take up that cause. Edited and selected by Shelley Fisher Fishkin, who has also supplied an introduction and afterword, Mark Twain’s Book of Animals includes stories that are familiar along with those that are appearing in print for the first time.
About the Author
Shelley Fisher Fishkin is Joseph S. Atha Professor of Humanities, Professor of English and Director of American Studies at Stanford University. She is the author of many books, including Lighting Out for the Territory: Reflections on Mark Twain and American Culture and Was Huck Black? Mark Twain and African-American Voices. She edited Is He Dead?, a new play by Mark Twain, and is also the editor of the 29-volume Oxford Mark Twain. Barry Moser is one of America's foremost wood engravers and is the proprietor of the Pennyroyal Press. Among the books he has illustrated are Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and Moby Dick, or The Whale, all from UC Press. The Mark Twain Project is housed within the Mark Twain Papers, the world's largest archive of primary materials by this major American writer.
Table of Contents
List of Illustrations
Introduction
Part One: 1850s and 1860s
Bugs!
Cruelty to Animals I
Jim Smiley and His Jumping Frog
Fitz Smythe’s Horse
Cruelty to Animals II
The Pilgrim
The Dogs of Constantinople
Syrian Camels I
The Remarkable “Jericho”
Pilgrims on Horseback
Arabs and Their Steeds
Part Two: 1870s and 1880s
The Cayote, Allegory of Want
With a Flash and a Whiz
Syrian Camels II
The Genuine Mexican Plug
The Retired Milk Horse
An Invention to Make Flies Curse
Peter and the Pain-Killer
The Pinch-bug and the Poodle
Bugs and Birds and Tom in the Morning
A Cat-Tale
The Presumptuous Ravens
Birds with a Sense of Humor
The Idiotic Ant
Cock-fight in New Orleans
The Bricksville Loafers
A Prescription for Universal Peace
Part Three: 1890s–1910
Letters from a Dog to Another Dog Explaining and Accounting for Man
The Phenomenal Flea
Huck Kills a Bird
The Bird with the Best Grammar
Ants and the True Religion
The Sailors and the St. Bernard
Man’s Place in the Animal World
The Marvelous Moa
The Inimitable Ornithorhynchus
The Laughing Jackass of Adelaide
The Phosphorescent Sea-Serpent
The Independent-Minded Magpie
The Bird of Birds
The Deadliest Song Known to Ornithology
The Pious Chameleon
A Pocketful of Bat
Hunting the Deceitful Turkey
Letter to the London Anti-Vivisection Society
The Victims
Extracts from Adam’s Diary,
Translated from the Original MS
Autobiography of Eve
Rosa and the Crows
Assassin
The Jungle Discusses Man
The Bee
“Was the World made for Man?”
A Dog’s Tale
Flies and Russians
Eve’s Diary. Translated from the Original
The Supremacy of the House Fly
Mrs. Clemens Corners the Market in Flies
The Edisons of the Animal World
A Horse’s Tale
Man and the Other Animals
The President Hunts a Cow
The Time I Got an Elephant for Christmas
Little Bessie Would Assist Providence
Letters from the Earth
Afterword
Note on the Texts
Notes
Acknowledgments
Index
