April 17 Tuesday – Sam wrote to an unidentified person about Benjamin Chapin, who performed on stage as Abraham Lincoln. This letter appeared in the Cleveland Plain Dealer on Apr. 22, 1906 in “Lincoln Lives in Ohio Actor.”
April 17, 1906. / In the beginning of the first act, while Mr. Chapin did seem to me to be a very close and happy imitation of Mr. Lincoln, it was only an imitation—an artificiality. But at that point the miracle began. Little by little, step by step, by an imperceptible evolution the artificial Lincoln dissolved away and the living and real Lincoln was before my eyes and remained real until the end. Happily to it that strong word “miracle” because I think it justified. I think that I have not before seen so interesting a spectacle as this steady growth and transformation of an unreality into a reality. / S.L. Clemens, (Mark Twain) [MTP]. Note: Chapin’s play on Lincoln ran from Mar. 26 to the week of Apr. 8 [NY Times Apr. 8, “This Week’s Offerings” p. X1]. It is not clear which day Sam attended the performance.
Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Mrs. Johnson came back from Washington. She paid me damn compliments. Life is sticky. Where are, are, are the ideals” [MTP TS 66-67].
Frederick A. Duneka wrote to advise Sam on the “best thing to do” about Bobbs-Merrill’s “attempt to re-publish some of your old non-copyright matter in the newspapers.” Duneka suggested they wait until “the book is issued, then get out an injunction preventing the sale or distribution…on the ground that at least one of the articles in the volume is not by Mark Twain.” He also announced: “We are going to get out a de luxe edition of “EVE’S DIARY” on hand made paper, —a limited edition to sell for $5.00 per copy. It ought to be profitable and it ought to be good advertising” [MTP].
Brander Matthews wrote to Sam. “Dear Mark: / Here is the MS of that paper I perpetrated on you eight years ago. I thoroughly enjoyed writing it; and I said what I thought—and very much what I had been saying in fragments here and there these many years. / Yours ever…” [MTP].
April 17, 1906. / In the beginning of the first act, while Mr. Chapin did seem to me to be a very close and happy imitation of Mr. Lincoln, it was only an imitation—an artificiality. But at that point the miracle began. Little by little, step by step, by an imperceptible evolution the artificial Lincoln dissolved away and the living and real Lincoln was before my eyes and remained real until the end. Happily to it that strong word “miracle” because I think it justified. I think that I have not before seen so interesting a spectacle as this steady growth and transformation of an unreality into a reality. / S.L. Clemens, (Mark Twain) [MTP]. Note: Chapin’s play on Lincoln ran from Mar. 26 to the week of Apr. 8 [NY Times Apr. 8, “This Week’s Offerings” p. X1]. It is not clear which day Sam attended the performance.
Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Mrs. Johnson came back from Washington. She paid me damn compliments. Life is sticky. Where are, are, are the ideals” [MTP TS 66-67].
Frederick A. Duneka wrote to advise Sam on the “best thing to do” about Bobbs-Merrill’s “attempt to re-publish some of your old non-copyright matter in the newspapers.” Duneka suggested they wait until “the book is issued, then get out an injunction preventing the sale or distribution…on the ground that at least one of the articles in the volume is not by Mark Twain.” He also announced: “We are going to get out a de luxe edition of “EVE’S DIARY” on hand made paper, —a limited edition to sell for $5.00 per copy. It ought to be profitable and it ought to be good advertising” [MTP].
Brander Matthews wrote to Sam. “Dear Mark: / Here is the MS of that paper I perpetrated on you eight years ago. I thoroughly enjoyed writing it; and I said what I thought—and very much what I had been saying in fragments here and there these many years. / Yours ever…” [MTP].
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