I've wrestled with the images of Sam Clemen's long descent into twilight
since I became serious about his old age & began mine.

  Having read God's Fool, more than once, I have been at odds putting
together the man who wrote Joan of Arc & Huck Finn with this report of his
last ten years. Certainly, his bitterness accompanied by unbearable loss
would have altered his writing & darker thoughts could have found their way
to the top of the pool.

  Hamlin Hill's reports of the old man surrounded by harpies as he
degenerated into a misanthrope have always felt false to me ... that & the
slightly hidden aspersions of a burgeoning alcoholism & Twain's acute mind
crumbling into senility. I never have believed it & prefer to think of Sam
Clemens as a man growing wiser in age, hurt by loss & overcoming.

  I'll continue to believe it.

  Thank you for sending this link to Laura Skandera Trombley's audio file
describing Mark Twain's Annus Horribilis of 1908 presented at Quarry Farm,
September 19th, 2007.

  Is there a written copy available either electronically or via the mails
of this presentation for those of us who are more than uncomfortable
listening to a talking computer.

  And one personal note ... & a question ... is Laura Skandera Trombley the
same Mark Twain authority who migh have married a fellow from a little town
called Tupper Lake ... his name was Nelson Trombley. We were boys together &
Tupper Lake was Hannibal with a French-Canadian accent.

  Regards
  Charles R Dunning