Life on the Mississippi
Life on the Mississippi ( Life on the Mississippi ) is a 1883 published narrative of US -amerikanischen writer Mark Twain about his own life as a pilot in various Mississippi - steamers in the period before and after the American Civil War . The book has been translated into German several times. In 1980 the work was filmed.
content
The book begins with a historical look back at the time when Hernando de Soto was the first European to see the river in 1542. The historical foray continues through French explorers such as Jacques Marquette and Robert Cavelier de La Salle in the 17th century to the first permanent European settlers. From the era of timber rafting and the beginning of steam navigation on the river, the plot is increasingly shaped by autobiographical elements.
In addition to personal memories and impressions, the book contains a large number of anecdotes from the Mississippi area. The main strand of the plot consists of the description of the apprenticeship years of Samuel Clemens (pseudonym: Mark Twain ), who completed several years of training as a pilot on a Mississippi steamer. He describes with great devotion the art of steering ships across the constantly changing river with its eddies, sandbanks and shallows. After completing his training, he steered various ships across the Mississippi as a pilot for a while, until shipping came to a standstill due to the Civil War . This part of the story first appeared in 1876 under the title Old times on the Mississippi .
In the second part of the book, Mark Twain describes his return to the river after 21 years, during which he took a steamship from St. Louis to New Orleans . He describes the race of steamships against the railroad, the new and big cities and his observations of greed, gullibility and tragedies on the banks of the river and the poor architecture in many places. Here, too, the plot is interspersed with numerous anecdotes and legends.
The book, published in the USA and Great Britain in 1883 , was the first in which the author sent a typewritten manuscript to the publisher.
expenditure
The book has been translated into German several times and has been published by several publishers in different versions.
- Mark Twain: Living on the Mississippi . Trans. V. Otto Wilck. Aufbau-Verlag , Berlin, ISBN 978-3-7466-6092-9 .
- Mark Twain: Living on the Mississippi . Trans. V. Otto Wilck. New Life Publishing House , Berlin 1969
- Mark Twain: Living on the Mississippi . Trans. V. Otto Wilck. Georg Bitter Verlag , Recklinghausen 1969
- Mark Twain: Living on the Mississippi . Trans. V. Helene Ritzerfeld. Insel Verlag , Frankfurt / Main 1977
- Mark Twain: Living on the Mississippi. Trans. V. Otto Wilck. Diogenes Verlag , Zurich 1990.
Web links
- Mark Twain : Life on the Mississippi. wikisource , 1883, accessed August 30, 2020 .
- Life on the Mississippi. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill , accessed August 30, 2020 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Kritikatur - The Library
- ^ The two thousand and one film lexicon
- ↑ Mark Twain: Life on the Mississippi - Chapter 1
- ↑ Mark Twain, Life on the Mississippi - Chapter 22
- ^ The First Typewriter ( Memento of November 3, 1999 in the Internet Archive )
- ^ Klaus Ensikat - Bibliography .
- ^ Klaus Ensikat - Bibliography .
- ^ Klaus Ensikat - Bibliography .