That "So-and-so must have too much time on his hands" statement always seems to me snarky and specious, if not kind of mean-spirited, in a passive-aggressive way. Was Twain only able to write Huck Finn because of having too much time in his hands? Did Artie Shaw become a great clarinet player because he found himself with no other possible uses of his time than to sit in his room and practice? Is it so that Michael Jordan became a magician of the basketball court due to having nothing else better to do? Fill in the rest of the questions with medical discoveries, geological explorations, etc. etc. ad infinitum ad nauseum.
"So-and-so must have too much time on their hands" is a too-glib brush-off of the value of any endeavor which obviously took a large amount of time to accomplish. The underlying message seems to be, "Don't do anything out of the ordinary; just sit on the couch and watch soaps, that way nobody will notice you."
Enough ranting, I guess; but that phrase is a pet peeve of mine. - B. Clay Shannon

      From: Kent Rasmussen <[log in to unmask]>
 To: [log in to unmask] 
 Sent: Sunday, February 19, 2017 1:08 PM
 Subject: Re: a question for everyone on the Forum
   
I appreciate Martin's and Steve's endorsements of my suggestion, and Stev=
e
is quite right in seconding my suggestion that any customer reviews we po=
st
on Amazon give praise only where it is due. Also, Arianne is correct in
sensing a connection between the authors I listed and the Forum. I used p=
art
of the Forum list of book reviews to search Amazon for unreviewed Mark Tw=
ain
books. And, believe me, there are a lot more than I listed.

I regard customer reviews as a far from trivial matter. Sure, giving fell=
ow
scholars five-star reviews on Amazon is a nice way to stroke their egos, =
but
that's not what makes such reviews important. Amazon is one of our window=
s
to the world. The reviews written for the Forum itself are wonderful for
drawing serious attention to books and keeping us up to date on what's be=
ing
written, but the Forum is a mighty small pond. Those reviews get read by
perhaps 400 people at the most. They're written for the already converted=
.
If we want to keep Mark Twain's name alive and draw more people into our
field, we need to extend our reach. Incidentally, if you look around, you=

may notice that we're aging, and there aren't a lot of young scholars mov=
ing
into the field. What does it say to people outside the field--especially
young people--that so many books on Mark Twain don't seem be worth anyone=
's
attention? If you search Amazon for recent books about Mark Twain, you=92=
ll
find that some do get a lot of customer reviews. Most of those books,
however, are written by journalists and outsiders to our field. Some more=

than deserve the praise heaped on them, but the huge imbalance in
distribution of reader reviews  seems to convey one clear message, viz.,
that anything resembling a scholarly work about Mark Twain isn=92t worth =
reading.

Not only should we use sites like Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and GoodRea=
ds to
praise our colleagues' work, we should also use those sites to get other
people excited about literature in general and Mark Twain in particular. =
So,
if you can find some moments to post customer reviews, try to  write thin=
gs
that make whoever happens to see your comments think, "Hey, this Mark Twa=
in
fellow is more interesting than I realized ... maybe I should read more
about him."

P.S. to Martin: You may be right about my having too much time on my hand=
s.
It's an occupational  hazard of being retired. I'll try to find more
productive uses of my time.