September 4 Friday – Sam and Livy wrote from Elmira to John Brown. Sam wrote of working on the manuscript that would become The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, writing on average 50 pages a day. Soon afterward, Sam’s “well dried up” and he put aside the manuscript after burning a chapter he didn’t like [Powers, MT A Life 354]. Sam had not answered Brown’s July letter, so felt the need to explain.

Day after tomorrow I go to a neighboring city [Buffalo] to see a five-act drama of mine brought out, & suggest amendments in it, & would about as soon spend a night in the Spanish Inquisition as sit there & be tortured with all the adverse criticisms I can contrive to imagine the audience is indulging in. But whether the play be successful or not, I hope I shall never feel obliged to see it performed a second time. My interest in my work dies a sudden & violent death when the work is done [MTL 6: 221]. Note: Clemens was in Buffalo on Sept. 7 to see the week-long tryout for the Gilded Age play at the Academy of Music.

Sam also wrote to his sister, Pamela Moffett about her son, his nephew, Sammy Moffett. The letter is rather harsh, but provides an interesting take on Sam’s estimation of book-larnin’ vs. real world experience. Sam was concerned about his nephew’s over-reliance on study, his mental health, and his eyesight.

Dear Sister—

Only a line—to warn you that at eighteen Sammy will be not more than 3 removes from an idiot, provided his mother goes on with her trust as she is now. It is strong language but true. It is a common saying that smart boys turn out fools at maturity—but they wouldn’t if their parents’ vanity did not sit weakly by & see them destroying their brains without the power to deny themselves the daily glory of the child’s prodigies & triumphs, & save a great intellect to the world by sternly putting the shackles on it & keeping it within bounds. At thirty, with firm and wise care, Sammy’s ought to be the brightest rising name in America—& if he should be blind & an imbecile to boot, at that age, don’t lay it to him, for he will not be to blame.

In school yet! For shame, to so wantonly trifle with so imperial an intellect! No creature can be such a traitor to a child as its own mother—no love so disastrous as a mother’s indulgence.

You need to comprehend that yours is no common trust. It is not the ordinary hulk of clay & stupidity that you are put in keeping of—& so not to be cared for in the ordinary way. You are placed in charge of a future great philosopher, statesman, or general, & by the Lord you are playing with it!—amusing yourself with its feats & its inspirations! You fall away below a just appreciation of the work that is given into your hands. God knows it is never the smart boys’ fault they are [dolts] at maturity,—but their own parents’, & a pity & a shame it is. Poor John Garth!—gifted like a God—& his parents & teachers reduced him to mediocrity & below it in eighteen years—at least below it in some respects.

Now don’t destroy this letter but keep it—& at 30, when he is a very one-horse doctor or lawyer in a very one-horse village, & of no sort of consequence in the world & doomed never to be, read this letter over again & confess that I was a prophet—or bequeath it to him & let him read it himself.

If you will put that boy on a farm where there is not a single book, & where they will keep him out of doors & work him just enough & play him just enough to build up a strong constitution for him—& then turn him loose on the books again 2 or 3 years from now, he will add an illustrious name to his country’s honored men—but just at present he is pointing as straight at the asylum for idiots as the needle points to the pole.

Old Mr. Morse (the grape man) is the person to put him with, I judge.

The baby flourishes. Livy progressing slowly. Love to all.

[Ys]

Sam

P. S. For months Livy & I have talked constantly of a farm life for Sammy & consequent salvation from the infernal books that are sucking at his life and his intellect. Pay his board, so that he can play whenever he chooses & they can’t force him to work. [MTP, drop-in letters]. See Sept. 9 to Pamela.