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Video Reminder:

A&E

Thursday, November 21, 1996

Mark Twain:
HIS AMAZING ADVENTURES

     PREMIERE: November 11 at 8pm/12am ET (5pm/9pm PT)
     LENGTH: 1 hour
     HOST: Jack Perkins
     PRODUCED BY: Greystone Communications for A&E Network
     **WORLD PREMIERE**

Mark Twain

     He was born Samuel Langhorne Clemens in 1835 along the Mississippi
     River as Halley's Comet was lighting up the sky. BIOGRAPHY: MARK
     TWAIN: HIS AMAZING ADVENTURES chronicles how the young Sam Clemens
     traveled restlessly along the East Coast, working as a typesetter
     and a newspaper reporter. At the age of 22, he returned to the
     Mississippi to fulfill his childhood dream of becoming a steamboat
     pilot. But his life was shattered by the onset of the Civil War. He
     joined a group of Confederate irregulars, but deserted after two
     weeks and headed west to San Francisco. He divided his time between
     mining, newspaper reporting and drinking. Soon he began writing
     under the name Mark Twain, a riverboat pilot's call, and his stories
     about jumping frogs and lectures on Hawaiian adventures made him
     famous in the West, but he knew only New York could offer him the
     worldwide fame and wealth he sought.

     He found more than fame in New York. He found a wife, a family and a
     career as an inventor, publisher, lecturer, playwright and author of
     famous books, including The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.
     Ironically, after what has been called America's greatest novel was
     published, fortune turned against its author. He was driven into
     bankruptcy by a failed investment and his beloved daughter, Suzy,
     died. After living abroad for most of the 1890s, he returned to New
     York to a hero's welcome as a man who represented the glory and
     independence of the nation's past. Mark Twain died in New York [sic] in
     1910, with Halley's Comet visible, once again, in the night sky.
     Through lively interviews with scholars, historians and authors, he
     lives again.
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     The Mark Twain House and its collection play a role in the following
     upcoming programs:

     A Lifetime Television program on biblical character Eve (March 1997);

     An A&E "Biography" on Woodrow Wilson;

     An A&E program on the history of the telephone;

     A segment about book challenges on "Dateline NBC";

     A Discovery Channel program about the discovery of the lost
     _Adventures of Huckleberry Finn_ manuscript.

     Air dates and details will be posted as soon as they are available.

               -- Kevin B.