November 17 Thursday – In Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to Frank Bliss.
I put in 5 days on 50 pages of Introduction, & then put it in the fire. A thousand dollars’ worth of work for nothing. An author cannot successfully write about his own books nor a mother about her own children—nothing but a poorly-concealed parade of silly vanities results. No one can do the job creditably but an outsider. No one can do it best for me but Howells or Brander Matthews.
November 18 Thursday – Sam attended a world premiere of the operetta Blumen Mary (Mary’s Flower Shop) at the Theater an der Wien. He was spotted by a Neue Freie Presse reviewer and his presence was reported the next day on p.6. The operetta was set in New York, with music by Charles Weinberger and book and lyrics by Leo Stein and Alexander Landesburg. Dolmetsch writes:
November 18 Friday – Estimated to be this day or just before, Andrew Chatto answered Sam’s Nov. 13 “scheme” about a special, limited, expensive edition of “Omar’s Old Age,” which was to be referred to in correspondence as “ABC”:
As a scathing satire on the crazy literary taste of today I consider the ABC a work of great genius—But in all my experience I have never known a case in which the writer of works of like inspiration did not at some time in after life regret the printing of them.
November – “In Memoriam” for Susy Clemens was first published in Harper’s Monthly for Nov. 1897. It was collected in How to Tell a Story and Other Essays (Hartford, 1900) and The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories (1906) [Budd Collected 2: 1003].
Sam’s tribute to the late James Hammond Trumbull written in Weggis, Switzerland, ran in the Nov. issue of Century Magazine.
Sam began the unfinished “Chronicle of Young Satan” in Nov. 1897 [Camfield, bibliog.].
November – “From the ‘London Times’ of 1904” first ran in the November issue of Century. It was collected in How to Tell a Story, and Other Essays (1900) and The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg and Other Stories and Essays (1900) [Budd Collected 2: 1004].
November 19 Friday – At the Metropole Hotel, Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to Chatto & Windus. He had long been interested in the case of Captain Alfred Dreyfus, a French officer sentenced to life imprisonment on Devil’s Island in French Guiana for passing military secrets to the Germans. In 1896 evidence surfaced that a French Army major named Ferdinand Walsin Esterhazy was the real traitor. At this time Esterhazy was about to be tried.
November 19 Saturday – In Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote one sentence on a postcard to Chatto & Windus, perhaps relating to his “quatrains” sent on Nov. 13: “I agree to the unwisdom of it—in fact, in any form or at any figure” [MTP].
November 2 Tuesday –In Vienna Sam also wrote to Bettina Wirth.
Mrs. Clemens corrects me. She says “My Grandfather’s Old Ram” is in print. She says it is in a book of mine whose American title is “Roughing It”—but the English & Tauchnitz editions bear another name—a name which we are not acquainted with. She thinks that the “Negro Ghost Story” is also in one of my books, but she doesn’t know the name of that book, & neither do I. The truth is, I am not very well acquainted with my books.
November 2 Wednesday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to James M. Tuohy of the New York World, who had requested a story for Christmas (Tuohy’s letter not extant):
For several months I have been at work a little, at considerable intervals, on two stories; & when your letter came both happened to be very close to the finish; I then added the necessary work and now they are done. …
November 20 Saturday – At the Metropole Hotel, Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to Percy Spalding of Chatto & Windus. He sent his poem, “In Memoriam” for Susy. Livy needed 50 copies of, together with a large photo of Susy; he was tardy in requesting these copies [MTP]. See Nov. 30? To C&W.
November 21 Monday – In Vienna, Austria, Sam cabled Harper & Brothers: “ROGERS HAS
HADLEYBURG. CLEMENS” [NB 40 TS 51]. Note: MTHHR 380n2 reveals that Henry M. Alden did not understand
the message, unaware of what “Hadleyburg” was. It quotes a letter of this date by Alden to H.H. Rogers: “We do not know exactly what this means, but we shall be glad to consider anything of his that you may have.”
November 23 Tuesday – True W. Williams (Truman), illustrator of Sam’s Sketches, New and Old, TS and HF, died in Chicago at the age of 58 from an aortic aneurysm. See entries Vol. I.
November 24 Wednesday – Sam’s notebook:
November 24 Thursday – Thanksgiving – Charlemagne Tower, US ambassador in Vienna, gave a reception at his residence on Alleegasse for all Americans. Sam and Clara were in attendance. Dr. and Mrs. Hiester Bucher (Vara Kalbach Bucher) met Sam and Clara, as recorded in Mrs. Bucher’s diary and published in Mary Leah Christmas’ A Honeymoon in Vienna, 1898-1899:
November 25 Thursday – A tempest was brewing at the Austrian Reichsrath. Dolmetsch provides the prelude to the sensational ouster of Nov. 26:
November 25 Friday – In Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote right after this day, reporting on the festivities at the US Consul Charlemagne Tower’s home to Bettina Wirth.
November 26 Friday – Sam’s notebook:
Nov. 26. To-day, 1.30, saw the great dramatic incident in the House when 60 policemen marched in & cleared the Presidium of 10 Social Democrats by violence. 4 were imprisoned on the premises. Wolf was arrested at 2 p.m. at 2.30 the Left seemed cowed, & made not much noise. So I left.
November 27 Saturday – Livy’s 52nd birthday.
The New York Times of Nov. 28, datelined Berlin, Nov. 27, ran a squib on p. 1, “Czech Hits Mark Twain,” headlined “The American Author Injured Going Out of the Reichsrath.” The report was false.
November 27 Sunday – Livy’s 53rd birthday.
November 28 Sunday – At the Metropole Hotel, Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to Samuel E. Moffett, who worked for the Hearst newspapers, including the N.Y. Journal. After offering the following he gave a brief, positive status for family members.
November 29 Monday – Sam’s notebook entry (for Dec. 1):
November 29 Tuesday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to unidentified men.
The enclosed have reached me from America.
It seems to me that your own condensed statement is sufficient, but if it needs enlargement there is an over-abundance of material in the American sketch—which is so minutely & so faithfully exact that I judge it was furnished by the Austrian police [MTP].
November 3 Wednesday – Again Sam attended a session of the Austrian Reichsrath. During a break in the proceedings, Sam met Dr. Otto Lecher in the restaurant. Lecher had given the marathon speech on Oct. 28- 29, and it’s clear from Sam’s account of that night in “Stirring Times in Austria,” that he admired the man [Dolmetsch 74]. Note: Sam’s notebook for Nov. 3 has several pages of notes from 8:45 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. [NB 42 TS 44-47]
November 30 Tuesday – Sam’s 62nd Birthday.
In Vienna, Austria Livy wrote for Sam to Chatto & Windus [MTP].
November 30 Wednesday – Sam’s 63rd Birthday.