One of Ninety Sets, with a Manuscript Leaf by Twain Tipped In

TWAIN, Mark.

Writings [Memorial Edition].

New York: Harper & Brothers, 1929.

Full Description:

TWAIN, Mark. The Writings [Memorial Edition]. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1929.

Memorial Edition, one of 90 numbered copies, this copy being number 15). Signed by the publisher on the limitation page. Thirty-seven octavo volumes (8 3/4 x 5 3/4 inches; 220 x 145 mm). Title-pages in blue and black. With frontispieces and numerous plates in each volume. Also includes a printed broadside for a November 13, 1884 public reading by Twain, at the Boston Music Hall, laid in to first volume.

Tipped in to volume I is an original manuscript leaf in (likely ca. 1887-88), completely in Twain's hand, on the back of stationary for the Victoria Hotel in New York. The manuscript comprises 25 lines of text, being an exercise from a work by "memory doctor" Professor Alphonse Loisette (aka Marcus Dwight Larrowe).

Publisher's three quarter green morocco over green cloth boards. Spines decoratively stamped and lettered in gilt. Top edges gilt, others uncut. Marbled endpapers. Spines uniformly sunned to brown. First volume with minor rubbing to outer joints and a few volumes with minor rubbing to outer board edges. Small ownership signature on front blank of each volume. Fore-edge of pp. 19/20 in eighth volume torn, just touching a few letters, but repaired. Overall a very good set.

A magnificent set of this fine and rare edition of Twain, complete with the Biography (volumes 30-33) and Letters (volumes 34 & 35) edited by Paine, and the Autobiography (volumes 36 & 37). With a manuscript page tipped-in volume I.

Despite Mark Twain's renown as a public speaker, he was known to have had a notoriously poor memory. Throughout his life he sought ways to improve his recollection. This manuscript leaf is evidence of one popular course he took, and whose initial enthusiasm for he quickly came to regret.

"In 1887, Twain was introduced to the work of Professor Loisette, who offered courses to improve one's memory through his Loisettian School of Physiological Memory. For a fee and a contractual oath of secrecy, Loisette offered courses that promised "the Instantaneous Art of Never Forgetting". The coursework, which claimed to reveal the laws of memory, was complex, as can be seen in Twain's manuscript here, which consists of nonsensical strings of sentences that were to be translated through a cypher provided by Loisette. As part of an exercise on "Recollective Anaylsis", the lesson ascribed numerical values to consonants, and that upon mastery could aid the student in quick recall. Twain was at first impressed with the results of Loisette's courses, and wrote glowing letters of recommendation, exclaiming that "Loisette doesn't make memories, he furnishes confidence in memories that already exist." Loisette would go on to publish Twain's words in ads and brochures promoting his school, and which greatly increased his membership, and profits. Only a year later, in 1888, Twain's esteem for the Loisette system soured, following the publication of George S. Fellows's Losiette Exposed. Fellows accused Loisette of plagiarizing his memory system, excoriated him for his exorbitant membership fees and contractual terms that bound its students to complete secrecy, and revealed that he invented his degree as well as his name. Furthermore, the book printed Loisette's complete course system, claiming there was no copyright, as well as reports of the profits Loisette had reaped. Most embarrassingly for Twain, Fellow also published some of Twain's own words of recommendation. Following the scandal Twain distanced himself from Loisette and his school, and asked him to stop using his words in promotional material. Despite being duped by Loisette, Twain would continue to find ways to improve his recollection, and in 1891, he produced a prototype called Mark Twain's Memory Builder. Unfortunately for him, there was little interest, and it was never commercially produced." (From Freeman's Auction).

Johnson, Twain, p. 153.

HBS 69250.

$18,500.

Price: $18,500.00

Item #69250