This question comes up from time to time...
Twain's voice was recorded on several occasions, but I've never been able to
track any of them down, and not for lack of trying. I know where one of them
was until WW2, but not since. The recordings include one speech, his
dictations for AC, some routine dictations to a secretary, a brief
conversation with an opera singer, a recording by a guy who said he and
another fellow were sent to record his voice, and probably a recording by
Edison when his film crew visited Stormfield. The Edison Labs burned in
1913.
I've looked for them in all the right places. A few years ago, while
exploring the basement of Stormfield (which is the only original part of the
structure that remains) I saw black voids in the crawl spaces beyond some
old walls and if I'd had a flashlight I'd have gone crawling after wax
cylinders that escaped the fire.
While looking for recordings of Twain I've stumbled across original
recordings of Jack London and O. Henry. The London recording was a badly
damaged wax cylinder that could not be played. I also discovered that both
Holmes and Whittier recorded their voices in a phonograph shop fronting the
Boston Common (but they don't survive). Better known are recordings by Walt
Whitman, Tennyson, etc.
NB: The recording of the jumping frog story by William Gillette is often
mistaken for an original Twain recording. Gillette gave that performance
many times and I know of two versions, with slightly different texts in the
story itself. Gillette's imitation is no doubt a good one-- on June 5, 1877
he impersonated Twain in Twain's presence and was praised by Twain.
NMB: So, I catch any performance by Hal Holbrook that I can.
Kevin
@
Mac Donnell Rare Books
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Austin TX 78730
512-345-4139
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----- Original Message -----
From: "Harris, Susan Kumin" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, November 29, 2011 5:42 PM
Subject: Twain Recording?
Today a colleague asked me if there were any extant recordings of Twain's v=
oice, and I realized that I have a memory of someone talking about an Ediso=
n recording--but also that it may have been destroyed. Can someone set me =
straight on this?
Thank you! --susan harris
Susan K. Harris
Hall Professor of American Literature
University of Kansas
Author of God's Arbiters: Americans and the Philippines, 1898-1902
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