Mark Twain as a Realist Writer

Mark Twain as a Realist Writer Considered one of the great American Realist  writers, Mark Twain is not only celebrated for the stories he tells but also the way in which he tells them, with an unmatched ear for the English  language and sensitivity to the diction of the common man.  To flesh out his stories, Twain also drew heavily on his personal experiences, most notably his work as a riverboat captain on the Mississippi, and never shied from portraying everyday issues in starkly honest terms.   Dead-On Dialects Twain was a master of conveying the local vernacular in his writing.  Read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, for example, and youll immediately hear the distinctive Southern dialect of that region.   For example, when Huck Finn attempts to help Jim, a slave, escape to freedom by paddling a canoe down the Mississippi, Jim  thanks  Huck profusely: Huck yous de  bes  fren Jims ever had:  en  yous de  only  fren olde Jims got now. Later in the story, in chapter 19, Huck hides while he witnesses deadly violence between two feuding families:   I staid in the tree till it begun to get ​dard, afraid to come down. Sometimes I heard guns away off in the woods; and twice I seen little gangs of men gallop past the log-store with guns; so I reckoned the trouble was still agoing on. On the other hand, the language in Twains short story The Celebrated  Jumping Frog of Calaveras County reflects both  the narrators upscale Eastern Seaboard roots and the local vernacular of his interview subject, Simon Wheeler. Here, the narrator describes his initial encounter with Wheeler: I found Simon Wheeler dozing comfortably by the bar-room stove of the old, dilapidated tavern in the ancient mining camp of Angels, and I noticed that he was fat and bald-headed, and had an expression of winning gentleness and simplicity upon his tranquil countenance. He roused up and gave me good-day. And here is Wheeler describing a local dog celebrated for his fighting spirit: And he had a little small bull pup, that to look at him youd think he wans worth a cent, but to set around and look ornery, and lay for a chance to steal something. But as soon as money was up on him, he was a different dog; his underjawd begin to stick out like the focastle of a steamboat, and his teeth would uncover, and shine savage like the furnaces. A River Runs Through It Twain became a riverboat cub- or trainee- in 1857 when he was still known as Samuel Clemens. Two years later, he earned his full pilots license. As he learned to navigate the Mississippi, Twain became very familiar with the language of the river. Indeed, he adopted his famous pen name from his river experience. Mark Twain- meaning two fathoms- was a navigational term used on the Mississippi. All of the adventures- and there were many- that Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn experienced on the Mighty Mississippi relate directly to Twains own experiences. Tales of Abuse And while Twain is rightly famous for his humor, he was also unflinching in his portrayal of abuses of power. For instance,  A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthurs Court,  while absurd, remains a biting political commentary. And for all his pluck, Huckleberry Finn is still an abused and neglected 13-year-old boy, whose father is a mean drunk. We see this world from Hucks point of view as he attempts to cope with his environment and deal with the circumstances into which he is thrown. Along the way, Twain explodes social conventions and depicts the hypocrisy of civilized society. No doubt Twain had a terrific knack for story construction. But it was his flesh and blood characters- the way they spoke, the way they interacted with their surroundings, and the honest descriptions of their experiences- that brought his  stories to life.

The Very First Mickey Mouse Cartoons

The Very First Mickey Mouse Cartoons In April 1928, cartoonist/animator Walt Disney had just had his heart broken when his distributor stole his popular character, Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, from him. On the long, depressing train ride home from getting this news, Disney drew a new character- a mouse with round ears and a big smile. A few months later, the new, talking Mickey Mouse was first shown to the world in the cartoon Steamboat Willie. Since that first appearance, Mickey Mouse has become the most recognizable cartoon character in the world. It All Started With an Unlucky Rabbit During the silent film era of the 1920s, Charles Mintz, Walt Disney’s cartoon distributor, asked Disney to come up with a cartoon that would rival the popular Felix the Cat cartoon series that played before silent motion pictures in movie theaters. Mintz came up with the name â€Å"Oswald the Lucky Rabbit† and Disney created the mischievous black and white character with straight, long ears. Disney and his artist employee Ubbe Iwerks made 26 Oswald the Lucky Rabbit cartoons in 1927. With the series now a hit, costs rose increasingly higher as Disney wanted to make the cartoons better. Disney and his wife, Lillian, took a train trip to New York in 1928 to renegotiate a higher budget from Mintz. Mintz, however, informed Disney that he owned the character and that he had lured most of Disney’s animators to come draw for him. Learning a depressing lesson, Disney boarded the train back to California. On the long trip home, Disney sketched a black and white mouse character with big round ears and a long skinny tail and named him Mortimer Mouse. Lillian suggested the livelier name of Mickey Mouse. As soon as he reached Los Angeles, Disney immediately copyrighted Mickey Mouse (as he would all the characters he would later create). Disney and his loyal artist employee, Ubbe Iwerks, created new cartoons with Mickey Mouse as the adventurous star, including Plane Crazy (1928) and The Gallopin’ Gaucho (1928). But Disney had trouble finding a distributor. First Sound Cartoon When sound became the latest in film technology in 1928, Walt Disney researched several New York film companies in the hopes of recording his cartoons with sound to make them stand out. He struck a deal with Pat Powers of Powers Cinephone System, a company that offered the novelty of sound with film. While Powers added sound effects and music to the cartoon, Walt Disney was the voice of Mickey Mouse. Pat Powers became Disney’s distributor and on November 18, 1928, Steamboat Willie (the world’s first sound cartoon) opened at the Colony Theater in New York. Disney himself did all the character voices in the seven-minute-long film. Receiving rave reviews, audiences everywhere adored Mickey Mouse along with his girlfriend Minnie Mouse, who also made her first appearance in Steamboat Willie. (By the way, November 18, 1928 is considered the official birthday of Mickey Mouse.) The first two cartoons, Plane Crazy (1928) and The Gallopin’Gaucho (1928), were then released with sound, with more cartoons on the way with additional characters, including Donald Duck, Pluto, and Goofy. On January 13, 1930, the first Mickey Mouse comic strip appeared in newspapers around the country. Mickey Mouse Legacy While Mickey Mouse gained the popularity of fan clubs, toys, and worldwide fame, Oswald the Lucky Rabbit faded into obscurity after 1943. As the Walt Disney Company grew over the decades into a mega-entertainment empire, including feature-length motion pictures, television stations, resorts and theme parks, Mickey Mouse remains the icon of the company as well as the most recognizable trademark in the world. In 2006, the Walt Disney Company acquired the rights to Oswald the Lucky Rabbit.