Synopses & Reviews
Winner of the Elizabeth Agee Prize for best manuscript in American Literature
With the publication of The Innocents Abroad (1869), Mark Twain embarked on a long and successful career as the 19th century's best-selling travel writer. Jeffrey Melton treats Twain's travel narratives in depth, and in the context of his contemporary travel writers and a burgeoning tourism culture. As Melton shows, Twain's five major travel narratives--The Innocents Abroad, Roughing It, Life on the Mississippi, A Tramp Abroad, and Following the Equator--demonstrate Twain's mastery and reinvention of the genre.
Review
"Melton's book addresses the issues of race, imperialism and culture in a measured, thoughtful way. . . . Melton is making deliberate headway and guiding the reader upstream, not simply allowing the reader to be swept passively along with the tide"--Mark Twain Forum
Review
"This book should be compelling to anyone interested in Twain, travel writing, or Americans' attitudes about travel. It may be a testament to Twain's enduring insights--or maybe just proof that human nature doesn't change--that his observations about American travelers are as relevant in the age of the jet as they were in the days of the steamship"--Foreword
Review
"Worthwhile reading for humor scholars, Twainiacs, and those interested in travel and travel theory generally." Choice
About the Author
Jeffrey Alan Melton is Associate Professor of American Studies at the University of Alabama and coeditor, with Alan Gribben, of Mark Twain on the Move: A Travel Reader.