The American Claimant.

TWAIN, Mark [Samuel L. Clemens].

$350.00

Item Number: 137138

New York: Charles L. Webster, 1892.

First edition of Twain’s comedy of mistaken identities with the publication date on both the title and copyright page. BAL 3434. Octavo, original publisher’s cloth, frontispiece and 25 in-text illustrations by Dan Beard. In very good condition.

Twain wrote The American Claimant with the help of phonographic dictation, making him the first author to do so. This was also (according to Twain) an attempt to write a book without mention of the weather, the first of its kind in fictitious literature (although the first sentence of the second paragraph references weather: "fine, breezy morning"). Indeed, all the weather is contained in an appendix, at the back of the book, which the reader is encouraged to turn to from time to time.