Mark Twain
Paperback | Pages: 712 pages Rating: 3.97 | 1383 Users | 107 Reviews
List Books Conducive To Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World
| Original Title: | Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World |
| ISBN: | 0486261131 (ISBN13: 9780486261133) |
| Edition Language: | English |
Narration To Books Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World
"We sai1ed for America, and there made certain preparations. This took but little time. Two members of my family elected to go with me. Also a carbuncle. The dictionary says a carbuncle is a kind of jewel. Humor is out of place in a dictionary." — Following the Equator So begins this classic piece of travel writing, brimming with Twain's celebrated brand of ironic, tongue-in-cheek humor. Written just before the turn of the century, the book recounts a lecture tour in which he circumnavigated the globe via steamship, including stops at the Hawaiian Islands, Australia, Fiji Islands, New Zealand, India, South Africa and elsewhere. View the world through the eyes of the celebrated author as he describes a rich range of experiences — visiting a leper colony in Hawaii, shark fishing in Australia, tiger hunting, diamond mining in South Africa, and riding the rails in India, an activity Twain enjoyed immensely as suggested by this description of a steep descent in a hand-car: "The road fell sharply down in front of us and went corkscrewing in and out around the crags and precipices, down, down, forever down, suggesting nothing so exactly or so uncomfortably as a crooked toboggan slide with no end to it. . . . I had previously had but one sensation like the shock of that departure, and that was the gaspy shock that took my breath away the first time that I was discharged from the summit of a toboggan slide. But in both instances the sensation was pleasurable — intensely so; it was a sudden and immense exaltation, a mixed ecstasy of deadly fright and unimaginable joy. I believe that this combination makes the perfection of human delight." A wealth of similarly revealing observations enhances this account, along with perceptive descriptions and discussions of people, climate, flora and fauna, indigenous cultures, religion, customs, politics, food, and many other topics. Despite its jocular tone, this book has a serious thread running through it, recording Twain's observations of the mistreatments and miseries of mankind. Enhanced by over 190 illustrations, including 173 photographs, this paperback edition — the only one avai1able — will be welcomed by all admirers of Mark Twain or classic travel books.Point Based On Books Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World
| Title | : | Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World |
| Author | : | Mark Twain |
| Book Format | : | Paperback |
| Book Edition | : | Anniversary Edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 712 pages |
| Published | : | September 1st 1989 by Dover Publications (first published January 1st 1897) |
| Categories | : | Travel. Nonfiction. Classics. Humor. Adventure. History. Autobiography. Memoir |
Rating Based On Books Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World
Ratings: 3.97 From 1383 Users | 107 ReviewsEvaluation Based On Books Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World
(In October 2015, my arts center had a chance to sell a first edition, first printing of Mark Twain's "Following the Equator." [Want to see if it's still for sale? Visit http://www.ebay.com/usr/cclapcenter .] Below is the write-up I did of it for the eBay listing.)By 1894 Mark Twain was already famous but was also almost completely broke, because of a bad series of investments in futuristic technology that would've never been able to work at the time they were being invented (he sunk what wouldOf Twain's book length works, this is the most obviously anti-imperialist, but it is also funny. Enlightening and entertaining.
I can hardly imagine anything better than traveling the globe with Mark Twain. His wit and keen powers of observation were abundantly apparent. Sadly, so was his prejudice; although, one must remember that this was written in an entirely different time, and that, thankfully most people have become more evolved and educated since then. One also has to remember that, as Twain reminds us himself in the book, he was brought up during slavery, to accept slavery and denigration of those of different
Twains Imperial tour. Amusing anecdotes, colorful scenes, caustic comments on white mans burden.
A nice book that give insight into the mindset of the people of the era. Mark Twain sets off from UK to traverse the world and the book gives details of the experiences of the author as he travels around.Each chapter starts with a quote from the Pudd'nhead Wilson's new Calendar. The detailed list of epigraphs are available at http://twain.lib.virginia.edu/wilson/.... Some of them are very good do read them. Some that appealed to me are1. Everyone is a moon, and has a dark side which he never
Overall, just okay (**) but there are enough moments that I really liked (****) or found amazing (*****) that I think a three-star rating is more accurate.There are lots of gems here and many of the aphorisms that begin each chapter (attributed to Puddd'nhead Wilson's New Calendar) are masterpieces but, at the end of the day, I have to confess that Twain's brand of humor tends to grow tiresome for me -- especially in a book this long. Having tried the print edition years ago, I listened to the
Twain is a delightful companion. This rambling remembrance of his round-the-world lecture tour with his wife & daughter charms & engrosses with the same warm, empathetic, critical, chuckling mind that informs his fiction. There is only one trait that is hard to take. Twain was an unmitigated apologist for Western imperialism. He displays not the slightest understanding of why the "natives" might fail to appreciate the gifts of order & "civilization" bestowed by their conquerors. I
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