"The Mysterious Stranger and other Stories", Twain: Feisty Clemens

If you can't read the title of this, it is The Mysterious Stranger and Other Stories. I bought it while in high school because of a show I caught on the Discovery Channel or the History Channel, back when they showed engaging documentary-type shows instead of the reality garbage they produce now, and on this show they spoke briefly about Mark Twain's story about the devil coming to a tiny Austrian town and messing with the people there, and about how he wasn't such a bad dude.

Wow, I remember thinking, I'd never heard of this story before. I searched it out and eventually bought this book. By far the longest story in the book is the last, "The Mysterious Stranger", and I can say that at that young age when I purchased the book, its length intimidated me, and for the longest time remained the only story that I hadn't read in the book.

I'd motored through the rest of them at some point before making the transition to pour soi, so they're true power (or occasional lack thereof) wasn't fully grasped by me. In fact, the only one I remember with any real sense is "The L1,000,000 Bank Note" (I'm using "L" to signify the pound-sterling symbol, the UK "dollar sign".). That story follows a poor American who went overboard while at sea, was picked up by some wealthy Britons who are engaged in a secret bet, and set the Yank up with a million-pound bill, like a million dollar bill. What ensues is his arrival in a town with only the soiled clothes on his back and his eventual rise from the ranks without ever spending any money. He tries, but everybody just laughs him off and gives him credit.

I probably read that story again after the pour soi transition...I vaguely remember thinking that would be a eat premise when I read about it in The Atlantic one year.

In any case, I finally read "The Mysterious Stranger" while I was living in Brooklyn, as it was one of the various books I read while doing the subway commute. I remember reading some background notes first, like a little history of the piece, seeing as it was last piece and was finally put together by a friend posthumously.

The background story went that Twain worked the ending a few different times, and was never really satisfied with it, and the ending that we see is really an ending that should be with another story, or the transition is not very good. Well, we can agree that a man of Twain's talents probably wouldn't have settled on the ending as it appears in most editions.

I don't want to give too much away, but Satan is a pretty nice guy who molds clay into living things for the amusement of the kids in a small Austrian village, and some lessons about being led to war and indiscriminate killing and subjugation that are as relevant and prescient today as they were in his time, or, really, anytime. That's the power of a great writer.

The ending does feel like it's slapped on and barely connected, but the power of the piece on the whole is there, and it's Clemens at his feistiest.

Here is a link to probably the creepiest claymation rendition of any story around. It may not be fully accurate to what's on paper, but it bizarre and worth looking at, especially if you're into weird creepy shit.