I thank John Bird for mentioning my _Sentimental Twain_ as I do, indeed
recognize Twain as a thinker.  But I've come to take my own thesis with a
grain of salt after reading Bruce Michelson's _Mark Twain on the Loose_,
which talks about humor as an escape, including an escape from the control
and determination required of serious thinking. This is not to say that
Twain's humor is not deep, nor to say that he wasn't a thinker, but only
to suggest that his humor is often at odds with his thinking, at least as
thinking is formally practiced.  He tended to think seriously through
satire, and to explore creatively--to escape thinking as his peers defined
it--through humor.

                                Gregg Camfield