How to Tell a Story: A Compendium of Sketches, Speeches, Letters, and Tales

In a priceless collection Grammy nominee (Letters from the Earth)and Twain aficionado Carl Reiner introduces a sampling of Twain's shorter works, drawn from his many speeches, lectures, and letters.

Some of the topics Twain covers are: How to Tell A Story, his private history of how he came to write his most popular tall tale, The Jumping Frog of Cavaleras County; On the Decay of the Art of Lying, his humorous reflection on what he considered a dying art form; My First Lie and How I Got Out of It, a reminiscence from his childhood days in Missouri; the hilarious Answers to Correspondents, drawn from his voluminous letters back and forth to fans; Concerning the Jews, Twain's very strong condemnation of anti-Semitism, My Debut as a Literary Person, a serious reflection on an incident from his riverboat captain days and how the experience inspired him as a writer in terms of story-telling, detail, and point of view; and An Encounter With An Interviewer (the interviewer loses). And there's a special section for children: the Story of the Bad Little Boy and the Story of the good Little Boy, Advice for Good Little Girls, and some Learned Fables for Good Old Boys and Girls, where his affection for children and trademark humor shine through these parables.