Mark Twain

Twain describes his experiences traveling in Europe and the Middle East, and pokes fun at tourists and tour guides.

Being Some Account of the Steamship Quaker City's Pleasure Excursion to Europe and the Holy Land, with Descriptions of Countries, Nations, Incidents, and Adventures as They Appeared to the Author

The Innocents Abroad, Or, The New Pilgrims' Progress

An unconventional and entertaining account of travels through German, the Alps and Italy

A Tramp Abroad

Patrick Book

This is worth it just for the appendix concerning the German language.

Life on the Mississippi

Colton Ray

This was exactly what it says in the title - a rambling, funny, interesting look at life on the Mississippi River during the mid to late 1800s, taking time to throw in local legends, history, statistics, quotations, etc. It's a hefty book and quite dense at times, but Twain's folksy, fun writing style salvages what could have been pretty dry information. It's clear from the beginning, where he chronicles his teenage years spent learning the ropes on a steamboat, that he has a deep affection for the material and the area, and that comes through in the writing. Huck Finn even makes a short appearance in one chapter! While I did start skimming through after a while, I enjoyed the book overall. As a picture of a time and place that are gone and never coming back, this book is invaluable.

Sarah Sammis

Life on the Mississippi is one of those books that has stuck with me from the time when I was first discovering my love of books. I first read it in 7th grade (21 years ago). As it was the year before I started my book diary, I can't pinpoint when with any greater accuracy. Rereading the book was like visiting with a long lost friend. I surprised myself at how well I remembered the "good bits."

A vacation tour up the Mississippi from New Orleans to St. Paul, detailed in the second half of the book, serves as the inspiration for his memoir about his training and career as a riverboat pilot. Besides his own training, he outlines the history of the river, it's geography, geology and its fickle nature. The piloting and river bits are my favorite parts of the book.

Twain also includes some tall tales and sketches about the people who live and work along the river. There are also essays on the changing political and economic climate along the Mississippi. By themselves, these asides are humorous but they breakup the flow of the book.

Laura Mauler

I now know more about steamboats than is seemly for someone in today's world. 

Joking aside, this book delivers on its promise of a good look at the life on the Mississippi River. And like the Mighty Mississip., it branches out into some unexpected places: corpse-watching in Germany, detailed descriptions of upperclass living rooms in St. Louis, trash-talking some author named Walter Scott, and even an extended scene from "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn", used to illustrate the fantastic swearing that rivermen used to do. The most memorable passages for me were the ones that described the shifting of the riverbanks and the scenery alongside them; quite evocative. 

NOTE: This book is in the public domain, and can be found for free on the Kindle and on Project Gutenberg (and in your local library, of course!).

The Innocents Abroad

Traci Wilbanks

The slog between bright spots was too arduous. Gave up after reading 25% of the book.

Bummel durch Europa

Kaya

Twains Auslassungen zur Sprache sollte ich mir durchlesen. Sehr vergnüglich. Aber als Reiseleiter bzw - Begleiter kann ich ihm nichts abgewinnen.

Jeremy Anderberg

Loved it. Often laugh out loud funny, but mixed with thoughtful observation and realistic takes on what travel is like. Some of the ethnocentrism is distasteful for modern ears, but I have to think that a large part of that is actually satire. Longer review coming later. 

4.5/5

jack

Twain's account of traveling in Europe, A Tramp Abroad (1880) sparkles with the author's shrewd observations and highly opinionated comments on Old World culture and showcases his unparalleled ability to integrate humorous sketches, autobiographical tidbits, and historical anecdotes in a consistently entertaining narrative. Cast in the form of a burlesque walking tour through Germany, Switzerland, France, and Italy, A Tramp Abroad includes among its adventure a voyage by raft down the Neckar and an ascent of Mont Blanc by telescope, as well as the author's attempts to study Art - a wholly imagined activity Twain "authenticated" with his own wonderfully primitive pictures included in this volume.

Hanna Tillmanns 

Gavin

One of the most famous travel books ever written by an American, The Innocents Abroad is Mark Twain’s irreverent and incisive commentary on nineteenth century Americans encountering the Old World. Come along for the ride as Twain and his unsuspecting travel companions visit the Azores, Tangiers, Paris, Rome, the Vatican, Genoa, Gibraltar, Odessa, Constantinople, Cairo, the Holy Land and other locales renowned in history. No person or place is safe from Twain’s sharp wit as it impales both the conservative and the liberal, the Old World and the New. He uses these contrasts to “find out who we as Americans are,” notes Leslie A. Fiedler. But his travelogue demonstrates that, in our attempt to understand ourselves, we must first find out what we are not. With an Introduction Michael Meyer and an Afterword by Leslie A. Fiedler

Dean Sas

Charles Dudley Warner

Satirizes the materialism and corruption in Washington, D.C. in the post-Civil War era.

The Innocents Abroad, Or, The New Pilgrims' Progress Being Some Account of the Steamship Quaker City's Pleasure Excursion to Europe and the Holy Land, with Descriptions of Countries, Nations, Incidents, and Adventures as They Appeared to the Author

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