Mark Twain Revisited

PBS re-aired Ken Burns' documentary on the life of Mark Twain (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). Twain's works, and his persona, have come to be overlaid with nostalgic sentimentality but a closes look at his writings show a much more complex reality. His novels, "Tom Sawyer" and "Huckleberry Finn" on close reading, are actually about children discovering the cruelty that underlies everyday reality. Some have criticized Twain for not fully confronting the issue of racism but within the context of 19th century the only White Americans who truly have a clear conscience on the issue were a small group of hard core abolitionists. Most white Americans failed to deal with the issue: the ex-Confederates invented the "Antebellum" myth which their descendants cling to this very day. Most moderate whites gave up on social reform by the end of the 1870's and embraced a culture of financial speculation (which parallels what's happened to America during the last four decades of the 20th century). Twain was no different from most people of the time although he did not become a total sell out. Twain always continued to denounce racism and imperialism as well as advocating voting rights for women. Twain embodied a time and place; 19th century America in all its promises and failures.