To James Redpath
28 December 1874 • Hartford, Conn.
(TS: TxU-Hu, UCCL 01170)

dec. 28. 1874.

dear redpath:

no, thanks’ my dislike of the platform has grown to such proportions that i believe i am at last one of those impossibilities which nasby denies the existence of ... A reformed lecturer. i am beyond the power of any of your seductions, my boy.

i am utterly[surprised], to-day, to find that i can really write about as fast with this machine as i can with a pen, & make more mistakes,[too].

yors ever,

mark.

line 15

lines 21–22

Explanatory Notes | Textual Commentary

Editorial Signs

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line 15 reformed lecturer] “A Reformed Lecturer” was Redpath’s pseudonym in “The Lecture System,” an article that Clemens helped him publish in 1871 (L4, 314, 322–23, 548–55). Clemens had last seen Nasby, and probably Redpath as well, in Boston in mid-November (see 9 Dec 74 to OC, n. 1).

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lines 21–22 yors ever, mark] Redpath’s stamped docket, in the right margin of Clemens’s letter, reads, “boston lyceum bureau. james redpath. dec 30 18[74.]” Possibly at a later date, Redpath mounted the letter on a separate sheet, on which he wrote the following note:

Mark Twain’s reply to an invitation of Jas Redpath to lecture once in New York after the conclusion of his Drama—the Gilded Age. The reply is ‘done’ by the “typewriting machine”—one of which he lately bought

JR

The Gilded Age play completed its run at the Park Theatre in New York on 9 January 1875 (see 11 Jan 75 to Raymond, n. 1).

Description of Texts and Provenance

Source text(s):

TS, made by Clemens, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas, Austin (TxU-Hu).

Previous publication: L6, 333–334; Goodspeed’s Book Shop 1924, lot 248g, excerpt.

Emendations and textual notes:

surprised • [‘D’ added in pencil]

too • [‘T’ added in pencil]