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Autobiography of Mark Twain: Explanatory Notes and Introduction
Mark Twain Project, Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, Mark Twain Project, 2010
Read the originalRead on October 16, 2026
- What it is
- The Mark Twain Project's introduction to the Autobiography, which explains how Twain began dictating to a stenographer in January 1906 and why dictation became his method of composition. It also notes his earlier dictation experiments.
- How much weight it carries
- Written by the scholarly editors of Twain's papers, with access to the manuscripts. It is the primary editorial account of how the autobiography was made.
Facts taken from this source
- The editors of Mark Twain's autobiography write that his autobiographical dictations would form the bulk of the book he called the Autobiography of Mark Twain.
“He soon decided that these Autobiographical Dictations would form the bulk of what he would call the Autobiography of Mark Twain” (Introduction, on the start of the autobiographical dictations)
- Twain began almost daily dictations to a stenographer in January 1906.
“He broke this pattern in January 1906 when he began almost daily dictations to a stenographer.” (Introduction, on the start of the autobiographical dictations)
- Mark Twain had experimented with dictation as a method of composition as early as 1885.
“which encouraged him to embrace dictation as the method of composition, something he had experimented with as early as 1885.” (Introduction, on the stenographer and dictation)