The Autobiography of Mark Twain · Chapter
Friday, February 16, 1906 explained
Mark Twain reflects on Susy's biography, which recounts the family's move from Buffalo to Hartford after the death of Jervis Langdon and the loss of their infant son Langdon.
What happens
Mark Twain reflects on Susy's biography, which recounts the family's move from Buffalo to Hartford after the death of Jervis Langdon and the loss of their infant son Langdon. He describes the oppressive year of mourning, the solace provided by David Gray, and the sale of his Buffalo newspaper at a financial loss due to his own inexperience.
Themes in this chapter
Family and Domestic Life
Susy's biography details the family's domestic life, including the baby Langdon's habits and the move to Hartford.
Mortality and Loss
The chapter is steeped in loss: the death of Jervis Langdon, the infant Langdon, and Emma Nigh, as well as the family's mourning.
Hypocrisy and Human Nature
Twain critiques Kinney's self-congratulation over a business deal that actually reflected Twain's own stupidity.
Characters to notice
- Mark Twain
Narrator reflecting on Susy's biography and his own past business decisions.
- Susy Clemens
Author of the quoted biography about the family's early life.
- Livy Clemens
Sold the Buffalo house and moved to Hartford; central to the family's decision.
- Jervis Langdon
His death prompted the move from Buffalo to Hartford.
- David Gray
Poet and editor, the only friend who visited during the mourning period.
- John Hay
Mentioned as a mutual friend connecting Twain and David Gray.
- Clara Spaulding
Called 'Aunt Clara'; helped care for Emma Nigh during her typhoid fever.
- Aunt Susie
Mentioned in Susy's biography as holding baby Langdon.
Key passages
“Our year and a half in Buffalo had so saturated us with horrors and distress that we became restless and wanted to change, either to a place with pleasanter associations or with none at all.”
The family's time in Buffalo was filled with so much grief and hardship that they felt compelled to move somewhere with happier memories or no memories at all.
Twain explains the emotional impetus for relocating to Hartford.
“In accordance with the hard terms of that fearful law—the year of mourning—which deprives the mourner of the society and comradeship of his race when he most needs it, we shut ourselves up in the house and became recluses, visiting no one and receiving visits from no one.”
Following the strict social custom of a year of mourning, which isolates the bereaved when they most need companionship, they withdrew from society entirely.
Twain criticizes the isolating nature of mourning customs.
“I have some little business sense now, acquired through hard experience and at great expense; but I had none in those days.”
Twain admits he has gained some business acumen over time, but only through costly mistakes; in his younger days he had none.
Twain reflects on his lack of business savvy when selling the newspaper.
