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Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

Mark Twain was born as Samuel L. Clemens in Florida, Missouri, in 1835, and grew up nearby the Mississippi River. His father died in 1847, leaving the family with little financial support, and Clemens became a printer's apprentice, eventually working for his brother, Orion, who had set himself up as a newspaper publisher. Through all his years in the printshop, Clemens tried his hand at composing humorous pieces. By 1856, he received a commission from the Keokuk Saturday Post for a series of comical letters reporting on his planned travels to South America. But on his way down the Mississippi, Clemens temporarily abandoned his literary ambitions to fulfill a dream he had since he was a boy. He apprenticed himself to become a riverboat pilot, and spent the next three years navigating the Mississipi River.
When the Civil War closed traffic on the river in the spring of 1861, Clemens returned to Orion again. In 1862 he was employed as a writer by the Virginia City Territorial Enterprise, signing for the first time his works "Mark Twain."
With "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County," published in 1865 by The Saturday Press of New York his style made its first appearance. In 1867 Clemens reported on a grand tour of Europe and the Mideast in Innocents Abroad (1869) which later became his first best-seller.
On his return to the United States, he married Olivia Langdon, and established with her in Harford, Connecticut, where Clemens finally turned from journalism to literature. The element of self-conscious irony would become the hallmark of Clemens' best work, especially evident in the novels set in his boyhood world beside the Mississippi River, Tom Sawyer (1876) and his masterpiece, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884).
Toward the end of his life, Clemens passed through a period of deep depression, due to his wife's and two of his daughter's death. He died at his home in Redding, Connecticut, in 1910.


Co che iero zovane a me ricordavo tuto, chel fusse succeso o anca no
co\' te si d\'acordo co\' ea majoransa xé \'l momento de fermarte a rifletare
ea civiltà xé un moltiplicarse illimità de inutii necessità
ea verità xé el vaeòre pì grando che gavémo. Sparagnémoea
el pericoeo nol xé mia queo che no savemo, ma queo che pensemo vero e in realtà no l\'é mia
ghe vòe el to nemico e \'l to amigo insieme par colpirte al core: el primo par parlare mae de ti, e \'l secondo par vegnérteo dire
gnente gà bisogno de cambiamenti quanto ee abitudini dei altri
l\'educassiòn xé fata principalmente de queo che ghemo desmentegà
l\'omo co na idea el xé un mona finché l\'idaa no ea gà suceso
l\'umanità ga\' a disposission soeo che \'na arma veramente eficace: ea risata
l\'unico modo par tenerse in forma xè magnare queo che no voemo, bevare queo che no ne piase e fare queo che te vorissi no fare
no abandonare ee to ilusioni. Co ee sarà svanie te continueré a esistare ma te gavaré smesso de vivare
no go mai permesso che ea scoea influisse co ea me educassion
qualsiasi emmosiòn xé sincera se ea xé invoeontaria
se te disi ea verità, no te ghè da ricordarte de gniente dopo
tuto queo che serve pa essere vincenti nea vita xé ignoransa e fiducia in se stessi
un omo no l\'é mai cussì sincero finché nol amete de essere buxiaro
xé cuorioso come el corajo fisico xé tanto comune nel mondo, invesse del corajo morae chel xé cussì raro
xe pì fassie ingannare ea xente che convinserla che ea xe sta ingannà