...sounds to me as if he was reading something about Poe. Who at that
time was already hailed as a genius, who had written poetry that wasn't
exactly of the easy-access type, and whose ignominious end in the
gutter was widely known --
Does that sound like a possibility?

w.

On Sun, 26 Sep 2021 00:29:03 -0700
 Scott Holmes <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>Were there any stops made by the America on its journey south? It
>seems unlikely that cholera would have been introduced at the outset,
>from San Francisco.  I read the "madeallthedifference" article but I
>don't sense the kind of fatalism in Twain's poem that would arise from
>deaths aboard the ship.  It also seems very early in his career for
>him to be too worried about being a genius. So, I remain a bit baffled
>regarding the subject(s) of his open verse.  I'm leaning towards the
>idea that he is reacting to something he was reading.  Passing out
>dead drunk in an alley doesn't fit with my image of the man.
>
>On 9/25/21 3:36 PM, Barbara Schmidt wrote:
>> I do not think there was any cholera aboard the steamer AMERICA when
>> Clemens composed “Genius” if the date in the notebook of Dec. 21 is
>correct
>> and that is when he did indeed write “Genius.”
>>
>> There is no indication of the cause of death of the child on
>Christmas Eve
>> aboard the AMERICA and attributing it to cholera may be difficult to
>prove.
>> The AMERICA arrived in Nicaragua on Dec. 28, 1866 and there
>encountered
>> cholera. It was after Clemens boarded the SAN FRANCISCO that the
>cholera
>> spread among the passengers and the tone of his journal entries
>changed.
>>
>> However ..... Notebook 7 is described as “chaotic” and without
>seeing how
>> the pages are bound in Notebook 7, it may be difficult to conclude
>on just
>> which leg of the journey the work was composed if those pages have
>been
>> disbound and reinserted at a later time.
>>
>> Barb
>>
>> On Saturday, September 25, 2021, Matt Seybold <[log in to unmask]>
>wrote:
>>
>>> Jocelyn & I recently wrote about this, including scans of the
>original
>>> from Twain’s notebooks, courtesy of the Mark Twain Project:
>>>
>>> https://marktwainstudies.com/madeallthedifference/
>>>
>>>> On Sep 25, 2021, at 3:53 PM, Scott Holmes <[log in to unmask]>
>>> wrote:
>>>> I posted this quote on Facebook without any explanation and got
>back
>>> some curious responses.  I'm wondering if anyone can add light to
>>> why-where-and/or when:
>>>> "Geniuses are people who dash off weird, wild, incomprehensible
>poems
>>> with astonishing facility, & then go & get booming drunk & sleep in
>the
>>> gutter…people who have genius do not pay their board, as a general
>thing”
>>>> I suspect he was reacting to someone being referred to as a
>genius...


Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Hochbruck
Dept. of English 
Centre for Security and Society
Albert Ludwigs University Freiburg
Rempart St. 15
D-79098 Freiburg
Germany