Hank Morgan, nineteenth-century New Englander, is knocked on the head with a crowbar and wakes up to find himself in sixth century England, during the reign of King Arthur. Ever resourceful, he determines to be boss of the entire country within three weeks, and with his use of the 'great and beneficent' miracles of nineteenth-century engineering, he triumphs. Hank's efforts to modernize Camelot by organizing a school system, constructing telephone lines, and inventing the printing press bring some unexpected results. A witty, often hilarious social satire that exposes utopian and romantic ideals and provides a disturbing analysis of the benefits of progress and dissolution of social mores, this is Twain's most ambitious work; a literary tour de force.
Included in this edition are the 221 original illustrations by Daniel Carter Beard, which Mark Twain himself praised as "better than the book - which is a good deal for me to say, I reckon."
The Toby Edition will also include a chronology and introduction by Werner Sollors, the Henry B. and Anne M. Cabot Professor of English Literature, Professor of Afro-American Studies, and Chair of the Program in the History of American Civilization at Harvard University. He is coeditor of The Black Columbiad and The Multilingual Anthology of American Literature.
| |
|
