Mark Twain: Romantic Realist

American literature took a sharp turn in the post-Civil War era of the nineteenth century, unleashing an intellectual backlash against the Romanticism of the previous years and replacing Romantic conventions with a more ‘realistic’ art, as authors of the day viewed it. This new Realism differed in content and style from its predecessor, yet the advocates of this approach still invoked elements of Romantic idealism into their works. One of the leading figures of the Realist movement, in fact, incorporated a Romantic sensibility into his major fiction creations. Many critics consider Samuel Clemens, known to the world as Mark Twain, as the archetypical Realist, yet he expressed in his novels a deep longing for an idealism that he could not find in the modern world. Though he often spoke of his distaste for “sentimentality and sloppy romantics” (qtd. in Bell 42), Twain nevertheless valued simplicity, clarity, surprise, interesting characters, and excitement in fiction. As Williams College English Professor Michael Davitt Bell writes, “these are the values of a writer who always preferred romance” (Bell 44). Twain, in fact, never referred to himself as a ‘realist’, and, indeed, eschewed all such labels that would confine him to a particular literary school of thought (Bell 45). His writings, however, suggest that the author would fit in with the Romantics more than any other literary movement, as his work contains many of the elements that critics consider essential to the Romance. Twain shows his Romantic nature, for instance, in his advocacy of individualism, his use of imagination within his characters, and his view of the superiority of nature as contrasted with the corrupting influence of society.

In order to understand Mark Twain as a Romantic, one must first know what Romanticism is, and this is not easy to grasp, since this movement embraces American authors as diverse as James Fennimore Cooper, Herman Melville, and Walt Whitman. In general, though, the idea has a few threads which tie these authors together, through style, content, or, most importantly, view of life. Romanticism begins, for instance, with individualism; that is, with a focus on one’s self, or, as literary scholar Lilian R. Furst describes it, with “a principle of order established not in terms of the outer world and an appeal to reason, but in terms of the inner world of the individual and an appeal to the imagination” (Furst 56). While Realism focuses on social responsibility, on one’s duty to his communal surroundings (Bell 48), Romanticism, in contrast, aims its glance at the actions of persons, of private entities, and points an accusing finger at a society that maligns the sanctity of the individual. In this matter of perception, as Furst states, “It is a fundamental trait of the Romantic that he invariably apprehends the outer world through the mirror of his ego as against the objective approach of the Realist” (Furst 58), meaning, in other words, that the Romantic sees the world as he wants to see it, while the Realist attempts to be detached from such sentimentalism, giving the world as he sees it a neutral report. Realism, however, as Bell writes, “depends upon the ‘reality’ of the writer’s subject matter” (Bell 18), and thus difficulties arise in attempting to place any author in the Realist category without regard to Romanticism and other literary movements, since such a viewpoint almost denies the need for art and is hence impracticable in literature. This is particularly true when in comes to Twain.

A central component of Romanticism is the focus on the individual, and Mark Twain expressed a definitively individualistic standpoint through his creation of characters. As scholar and novelist Andrew Jay Hoffman writes,

Mark Twain attempted . . . to find a kind of heroism which could at very least survive the world as he saw it. To give his heroes even a chance, he empowered them supernaturally. He idealized them, made more of them than simply realistic characters . . . These characters strike a balance between their traditional heroism and the circumstances they find themselves in by becoming symbols of hope for release from the real worlds those circumstances depict (Hoffman viii).

Twain shows his individualistic attitude through the actions of his heroes, the most striking of whom is Huck, the young protagonist of the author’s most famous novel, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Twain portrays Huck as a truly unique entity – an idealist in a less than ideal world. Through Huck Finn, Twain expresses his longing for an idealism that he sees lacking in man. The fictional boy is a true nonconformist in his rejection of societal norms, and his willingness to treat his friend Jim, a runaway slave, as a human being and an equal, which contrasts with the teachings of his youth. Twain also uses the character of Hank Morgan in A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court to demonstrate the superiority of judging individuals by their own merit to the old European method of deciding one’s worth on the basis of his bloodline. The author in this point utilizes his protagonist’s actions to lampoon old collectivist notions of class, particularly in a scene where King Arthur and his knights promote a noble-born ignoramus over a deserving and intelligent man of the peasant class (Clemens 138-43), disregarding the objections of the nineteenth-century hero. This is clearly a case of Twain’s campaigning for the primacy of the individual. Though Hank is not perfect, and in fact he serves as an example of the problems of modern society, he nevertheless makes poignant observations, as he comments at one point in admiration of a certain man’s spirit, “A man is a man, at bottom. Whole ages of abuse and oppression cannot crush the manhood clear out of him” (Clemens 173).

Individualism is certainly a central aspect of Romantic thought, but another key component of the movement is an appreciation for the imagination, which is of great importance in the creation of a true Romantic hero, for it is only through his inventive faculty that such a protagonist can succeed in obtaining his goals. Furst states to this effect that,

Just as the individual is the pivot of the Romantic universe, so within the individual the focal point is his imagination, his power to perceive and recreate the world according to his own inner vision . . . his own ego, by means of which he endeavours to control the outer universe, to re-shape it through his imagination. (Furst 119)

The hero wins, if he can, not through strength of arms, but by the use of his wits, bringing his resourcefulness to the forefront of his thinking. He must often lie, create stories, or invent new methods of escape in order to achieve his victory, and such actions depend entirely on the strength of the character’s imagination. Through the utilization of his own egocentric perception, the protagonist’s imagination “acts first and foremost as an image-making force” (Furst 171), creating the world in which he wants to live within the confines of his own mind, after which he attempts to place that image upon the real world in which he finds himself.

While Twain shows an aspect of his Romantic nature through his respect for the sanctity of the individual, he also brings to light the importance of imagination in the lives of his characters. He utilizes his imagination himself, for instance, in creating the ‘realistic’ fantasy worlds in which his characters live, such as the Camelot of Connecticut Yankee or the riverside towns of Huckleberry Finn, after which he imbues his heroes with their own imaginative qualities and, by setting his narratives in first person form, gives them free reign to create the universe as they see fit. Possibly the most potent examples of the active imagination within any fictional protagonists are the lies and inventions of Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn in Huck’s narrative, and Hank Morgan’s attempt to recreate the world of Camelot in his own image in Connecticut Yankee. Tom, for instance, brandishes his creative faculty in planning and executing their plan to spring Jim from captivity. Unfortunately, Tom has a tendency to let his imagination carry him away, as he attempts to live out the stories of the novels and romances that he reads, with little regard for the actual facts of reality, and thus at the end of this episode he is shot in the leg and Jim is recaptured (Twain 217-223). Huck, on the other hand, though he admires Tom’s unique genius, still thinks that his friend’s overblown ideas are foolish, and he uses his own wits for more practical pursuits, making up lies when they suit his purposes in obtaining his goal, as he does when he must prevent white slave-hunters from discovering Jim (Twain 80-2). Despite these differences in motive, by using their inventive minds to accomplish their ends, and particularly by creating stories that suit their intentions, both characters display a true appreciation for man’s imaginative ability. Hank Morgan uses a great deal of imagination, as well, as he attempts to implant his idea of the perfect society upon the dogmatic people of sixth-century England. To do this, he must recreate himself as the kind of figure that the public understands, and so he uses his scientific and mechanical knowledge to become a ‘magician’, thereby turning the peoples’ own superstitions to his advantage, winning esteem in the King’s court, and setting the stage for his rule of the kingdom (Clemens 127). His creative faculties help him to adapt to different situations, as he invents different stories and reasons throughout the novel to convince people to take his advice, but in the end his designs backfire on him – like Tom Sawyer, Hank cannot make the ‘real’ world conform to that of his imagination, but he nonetheless serves as a fine example of the way Twain employs the imaginative process in his characters.

An active imagination and an individualistic attitude are important characteristics of a Romantic hero, but the idea of Romanticism in general also encompasses a great respect for nature, praising the purity of the natural world and decrying the corruption that human association can bring. Lilian R. Furst writes that the Romantic sees nature “as an animate being” (Furst 84), a living entity in itself that acts upon men as men act upon it. Stemming from the focus on the self and on the sanctity of the individual, the Romantic viewpoint generally portrays nature as something pure, a dangerous cleansing force that brings to light the follies of civilization. Rather than putting their faith in ‘mankind’, the Romantics hold “a quasi-religious belief in the total fusion of man with nature” (Furst 89), which seems to show mistrust in man’s association with anything else, particularly with other men. As Professor Hugo describes the movement, “Doubts about progress, civilization, and the primacy of intellect were augmented when it seemed likely that men were better in a state of nature” (Hugo 34-5). In other words, Romanticism holds that man is better in solitude, and can only truly live a moral life when he communes directly with the natural world instead of accepting the artificial conventions of human society. This viewpoint ties in with the focus on individualism, but instead of looking inward to the man and concentrating on his own significance as himself, it places him in a context that properly affirms his existence, and contrasts it with the social surroundings that do not enable the individual to live honestly.

Mark Twain’s art demonstrates not only an admiration for the individual man and a respect for his imagination, but also a profound awe of the power and beauty of nature. Twain sees nature as something pure, a sanitizing force that can drown out the filth and corruption of modern society. The reader sees this through Huck’s eyes, for instance, as the boy observes the mighty Mississippi River eating away the ground on its banks, dragging houses down into its waters and gradually forcing civilization back (Twain 118). Huck then sees more concrete examples of the corruption of the world of men, involving some men reducing themselves to the state of animals with a pack mentality, and other men cheating and stealing from people as a way of life, to which he responds, “I never see anything so disgusting” (Twain 136). Huck cannot stand the idea of anyone trying to “sivilize” him, and in the end he finds he must “light out for the Territory” to live an honest, moral, and true life, the kind of life that his idealistic nature demands (Twain 230). Twain also shows the moral bankruptcy of modern culture in his portrayal of Hank Morgan, the man of the Industrial Revolution and the penultimate product of the machine age, as Hank’s application of nineteenth-century values to the sixth-century world of Camelot brings that entire society to collapse (Clemens 255). Man is obviously not a machine, and cannot truly function in a world that separates him from his natural state thus. Despite his status as a corrupted product of civilization, however, Hank still makes certain passionate statements about the wrongful way men treat other men, such as, “There are times when one would like to hang the whole human race and finish the job” (Clemens 174), showing a disgust for the world of social interactions similar to Huck Finn’s disillusionment. When he sees a group of children emulating their elders by “playing mob,” the children by accident nearly hang one of their own number – an event that clearly demonstrates the problem of mob rule in the world of men, and the collective thinking of society throughout the ages (Clemens 174).

Though many critics consider Mark Twain one of the leading spokesmen for the American Realists, he seems to share more in common with the Romantics, as his work contains several of the key elements of Romantic thought. In his respect for nature, for instance, and his distrust of civilization, Twain shares the idealistic view of the natural world. He portrays this idealism in his characters, as well, imbuing them with the imaginative faculties necessary to survive their situations. And, of course, Twain proves himself the ardent individualist, holding to the central component of Romanticism – a belief in the primacy of the individual.