
Chasing the Last Laugh
Description
Alles über E-Books | Antworten auf Fragen rund um E-Books, Kopierschutz und Dateiformate finden Sie in unserem Info- & Hilfebereich.
Mark Twain, the highest-paid writer in America in 1894, was also one of the nation's worst investors. "There are two times in a man's life when he should not speculate," he wrote. "When he can't afford it and when he can." The publishing company Twain owned was failing; his investment in a typesetting device was bleeding red ink. After losing hundreds of thousands of dollars back when a beer cost a nickel, he found himself neck-deep in debt. His heiress wife, Livy, took the setback hard. "I have a perfect horror and heart-sickness over it," she wrote. "I cannot get away from the feeling that business failure means disgrace."
But Twain vowed to Livy he would pay back every penny. And so, just when the fifty-nine-year-old, bushy-browed icon imagined that he would be settling into literary lionhood, telling jokes at gilded dinners, he forced himself to mount the "platform" again, embarking on a round-the-world stand-up comedy tour. No author had ever done that. He cherry-picked his best stories-such as stealing his first watermelon and buying a bucking bronco-and spun them into a ninety-minute performance.
Twain trekked across the American West and onward by ship to the faraway lands of Australia, New Zealand, Tasmania, India, Ceylon, and South Africa. He rode an elephant twice and visited the Taj Mahal. He saw Zulus dancing and helped sort diamonds at the Kimberley mines. (He failed to slip away with a sparkly souvenir.) He played shuffleboard on cruise ships and battled captains for the right to smoke in peace. He complained that his wife and daughter made him shave and change his shirt every day.
The great American writer fought off numerous illnesses and travel nuisances to circle the globe and earn a huge payday and a tidal wave of applause. Word of his success, however, traveled slowly enough that one American newspaper reported that he had died penniless in London. That's when he famously quipped: "The report of my death was an exaggeration."
Throughout his quest, Twain was aided by cutthroat Standard Oil tycoon H.H. Rogers, with whom he had struck a deep friendship, and he was hindered by his own lawyer (and future secretary of state) Bainbridge Colby, whom he deemed "head idiot of this century."
In Chasing the Last Laugh, author Richard Zacks, drawing extensively on unpublished material in notebooks and letters from Berkeley's ongoing Mark Twain Project, chronicles a poignant chapter in the author's life-one that began in foolishness and bad choices but culminated in humor, hard-won wisdom, and ultimate triumph.
More details
Other editions
Additional editions




Person
Content
- Intro
- Other Titles
- Title Page
- Copyright
- Dedication
- Contents
- Prologue
- Chapter 1 | Joys of Self-Publishing
- Chapter 2 | Printing Mogul
- Chapter 3 | Safe Eggs and Broken Eggs
- Chapter 4 | The Trials of Paige and Joan of Arc
- Chapter 5 | An Odd Homecoming
- Chapter 6 | Not Enough Time to Curse
- Chapter 7 | Twain Grilled, Livy Burnt
- Chapter 8 | America: Dry Run for the World
- Chapter 9 | Traveling with a Volcano
- Chapter 10 | Separation
- Chapter 11 | At Sea
- Chapter 12 | Greetings, Mate
- Chapter 13 | Cashing in on the Platypus
- Chapter 14 | Maoriland
- Chapter 15 | Birthdays and Longing
- Chapter 16 | To India
- Chapter 17 | Bombay!
- Chapter 18 | Eyes Wide
- Chapter 19 | Rails, Riches and Elephants
- Chapter 20 | Holy Cities
- Chapter 21 | The Heart of the British Raj
- Chapter 22 | Himalayan Joy Ride
- Chapter 23 | Mutiny on the Ganges
- Chapter 24 | Feverish in the Pink City
- Chapter 25 | Dreams at Sea
- Chapter 26 | Africa
- Chapter 27 | Reuniting the Family
- Chapter 28 | Alone in London
- Chapter 29 | Helen Keller
- Chapter 30 | A London Revival
- Chapter 31 | Charitable Schemes
- Chapter 32 | Joys of Payback
- Chapter 33 | Back in the Game
- Chapter 34 | Homecoming
- Postscript
- Acknowledgments
- Appendix
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Illustration Credits
- About the Author
- Illustrations
System requirements
File format: ePUB
Copy protection: Adobe-DRM (Digital Rights Management)
System requirements:
- Computer (Windows; MacOS X; Linux): Install the free reader Adobe Digital Editions prior to download (see eBook Help).
- Tablet/smartphone (Android; iOS): Install the free app Adobe Digital Editions or the app PocketBook before downloading (see eBook Help).
- E-reader: Bookeen, Kobo, Pocketbook, Sony, Tolino and many more (not Kindle).
The file format ePub works well for novels and non-fiction books – i.e., „flowing” text without complex layout. On an e-reader or smartphone, line and page breaks automatically adjust to fit the small displays.
This eBook uses Adobe-DRM, a „hard” copy protection. If the necessary requirements are not met, unfortunately you will not be able to open the eBook. You will therefore need to prepare your reading hardware before downloading.
Please note: We strongly recommend that you authorise using your personal Adobe ID after installation of any reading software.
For more information, see our ebook Help page.