There is a little known essay - quite old now - on the differences in content in the US and UK versions of Following the Equator. In case of interest it is by Dennis Welland, 'Mark Twain's Last Travel Book,' Bulletin of the New York Public Library, Vol 69, No 1 (Jan 1969)pp. 31-48.

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From: Mark Twain Forum on behalf of Kevin Mac Donnell
Sent: Fri 27/08/2010 2:48 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Following the Equator



Regarding the best reading edition of  FOLLOWING THE EQUATOR--

The English edition, MORE TRAMPS ABROAD, contains 6,000 words deleted from
the American edition. On the other hand, the American edition includes 1,400
words not in the English edition. So, neither is entirely satisfactory as a
reading edition.

Is there an edition that provides the full text? I reckon I dunno. I'm not
sure an edition with the "full text" could be considered authorial in the
sense that it would reflect Twain's final intentions, but so long as the
altered texts were designated as such, it would make for good reading. I
don't know if the 1899 collected edition of FTE was revised by Twain. I have
marked proof copies for two works from that edition, but not FTE, and I have
not compared the 1899 text to the 1897 English and American editions.
Perhaps the MTP knows to what extent Twain was aware of those textual
differences and whether he revised the 1899 setting.

If he did revise the text, then any FTE odd volumes from the 1899 edition
would do. That setting was used to print several later editions. BUT, you'd
miss out on the original illustrations that appeared in the 1897 American
edition (they are not present in the 1897 English edition). The Oxford
edition simply reproduces the American edition, and not the English, but has
a good essay on the illustrations by Beverly David.

Then, of course, there's the first Canadian edition (Vancouver, 1899)...

Kevin
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