Center For Mark Twain Studies Explained

The Center For Mark Twain Studies is a cultural humanities site associated with Elmira College. The Center manages two historic sites, the Octagonal Study and Quarry Farm, where the American author, Mark Twain, composed many of his works, including his 1884 novel Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.[1] The center also includes exhibits and archives. It administers research fellowships and delivers extensive programming, including lectures series, symposia, teachers institutes, digital resources, podcasts, and the quadrennial International Conference on the State of Mark Twain Studies.[2]

History and founding

Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) first visited Elmira in 1868 at the invitation of Charles Langdon, a young man he had befriended during the Holy Land Excursion of the Quaker City (formerly USS Quaker City), a pleasure cruise which Twain would soon turn into his first bestselling book, The Innocents Abroad (1869).[3] During the trip, Langdon had shown Clemens as picture of his sister, Olivia Langdon.[4] On New Year's Eve 1867, Sam Clemens and Livy Langdon were formally introduced, beginning a courtship which would result in marriage on February 2, 1870.[5]

Shortly after their engagement, Langdon began worrying that her marriage to the itinerant Clemens would permanently sever her from her family, inspiring Clemens to make "an extraordinary promise."[6] Starting the year after they were married, the Clemens family made an annual Summer pilgrimage to Quarry Farm, where they stayed, usually for 3–4 months, with Livy Clemens's older sister and her husband, Theodore and Susan Crane.[7]

In addition to allowing his wife and daughters to maintain strong ties with their extended family and the Elmira community, Sam quickly found that it was an exceptional writing environment. "I can write ten chapters in Elmira where I can write one [in Hartford]," he told a friend in 1875.[8] The previous year, the Cranes had built for him an Octagonal Study, designed to resemble the pilot house on a steamboat, at the peak of East Hill, overlooking the Chemung River Valley, about 100 yards from the main house at Quarry Farm.[9] Here he would compose the majority of four novels, three memoirs, and hundreds of stories, essays, and speeches over the next two decades. In 1886, he told a visiting reporter, "This may be called the home of Huckleberry Finn and other books of mine, for they were written here."[10]

Sam and Livy Clemens made their last extended residency at Quarry Farm in 1903, the year before her death.[11] Both are buried nearby in the Langdon family plot at Elmira's Woodlawn Cemetery.[12] But the property remained in the Langdon family for generations, until it was entrusted to Elmira College in 1982, the official founding of the Center For Mark Twain Studies, by Jervis Langdon Jr.[13] Livy Clemens had been a student at Elmira Female College and her father, Jervis Langdon, was among the college's founders.[14] The family ties to the college were deepened when the Clemens's niece, Ida Langdon, became a professor there. She arranged for the Octagonal Study to be relocated from Quarry Farm to the Elmira College campus in 1952.[15] Her nephew, Langdon Jr., was the final member of the family to reside at Quarry Farm. He set the terms of the agreement with Elmira College that Quarry Farm would never be open to the general public, but would be reserved for promoting scholarship about Mark Twain and his circle.[16]

Quarry Farm Fellows

In observance of Langdon Jr.'s mandate, CMTS sponsors an annual fellowship competition for scholarly "scholarship and creative works related to Mark Twain, including, but not limited to, his literature, life, family, associations, influences, reception, and significance."[17] In 2022, they made awards to 11 Fellows, each of whom was granted a 1-4 week residency at Quarry Farm, as well as an honorarium and access to archival collections. One fellowship was reserved for a creative writer, one for a visual artist, and three for early career researchers.[18]

Programming

The Trouble Begins lectures

In 1985, the sesquicentennial of Sam Clemens's birth and the centennial of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, CMTS launched its first lecture series, The Trouble Begins at 8, the title draw from the advertising for Twain's first lecture.[19] The initial program features five lecturers, including Leo Marx and Henry Nash Smith. The series was expanded in 1988 and several times since. Since 2017, it has consisted of 10-12 lectures each year, split between "The Barn," an auditorium retrofitted for the purpose on the Quarry Farm grounds, and the Elmira College campus, as well as additional Summer lectures at the Park Church. Many lectures, going back to the initial program in 1985, are recorded and archived on the CMTS website.[20]

The International Conference on The State of Mark Twain Studies

Every four years, CMTS hosts a conference for hundreds of Twain researchers. The first gathering took place in 1989.[21] The 2021 conference was postponed until 2022.

Conferences

Source:[22]

The Quarry Farm Weekend Symposium

CMTS also hosts a much smaller annual symposium each Fall on specialized topics.[23]

Symposia Themes

Source:

The Summer Teachers Institute

Each July, CMTS hosts primary and secondary teachers for a two-day workshop. Since 2019, the STI has been coordinated by Jocelyn Chadwick and CMTS's resident scholar, Matt Seybold.[24]

The American Vandal Podcast

Seybold is also the producer and host of the CMTS podcast, The American Vandal Podcast:[25]

Staff

Full-time staff at CMTS include a director, a resident scholar, an archivist, and a caretaker, who lives in a guest house constructed on the Quarry Farm property. Since 2016, the Director has been Joseph Lemak.[26]

Notes and References

  1. Web site: CALL . By Diane Stoneback, ALLENTOWN MORNING . Mark Twain's 'foretaste of heaven' in N.Y. . 2022-07-06 . inquirer.com . en.
  2. Web site: About CMTS . 2022-07-06 . Center for Mark Twain Studies . 14 April 2016 . en-US.
  3. Web site: Mark Twain and the Holy Land New-York Historical Society . 2022-07-06 . www.nyhistory.org . en.
  4. Book: Morris, Roy . American Vandal: Mark Twain Abroad . 2015 . Harvard University Press . 978-0-674-41669-7 . en.
  5. Web site: Twain's Summer Home: Visiting Elmira, N.Y. . 2022-06-16 . NPR.org . en.
  6. Web site: Seybold . Matt . 2018-09-19 . 150 Years of Mark Twain in Elmira: Dickens Holidays, The Gospel of Revolt, & The Quarry Farm Style . 2022-06-16 . Center for Mark Twain Studies . en-US.
  7. Book: Jerome, Robert D. . Mark Twain in Elmira . 1977 . Elmira College Center for Mark Twain Studies . 978-0-578-12626-5 . en.
  8. Book: Twain, Mark . Mark Twain's Letters, Volume 6: 1874-1875 . 2002-11-29 . University of California Press . 978-0-520-92993-7 . en.
  9. Web site: Mark Twain's Study at Elmira College . 2022-06-16 . www.amusingplanet.com . en.
  10. Web site: Winter 2011, Volume 10, Number 3 :: New York State Archives Partnership Trust . 2022-06-16 . www.nysarchivestrust.org.
  11. Web site: Janowski . Diane . Elmira History: Imagining Elmira in the time of Mark Twain . 2022-07-06 . Star-Gazette . en-US.
  12. Web site: Mark Twain's Grave . 2022-06-16 . Atlas Obscura . en.
  13. Web site: 2022-02-14 . FreightWaves Classics/Leaders: Jervis Langdon led railroads during very turbulent times . 2022-07-06 . FreightWaves . en-US.
  14. Book: Harris . Susan K. . The Courtship of Olivia Langdon and Mark Twain . Harris . Joyce and Elizabeth Hall Distinguished Professor of American Literature and Culture Susan K. . 1996 . Cambridge University Press . 978-0-521-55650-7 . en.
  15. Web site: Elmira College and Mark Twain . 2022-06-16 . Center for Mark Twain Studies . 23 April 2020 . en-US.
  16. Web site: Manuscript Library Chemung County Historical Society . 2022-06-16 . www.chemungvalleymuseum.org.
  17. Web site: 2023 Quarry Farm Fellowships Guidelines . 2022-06-16 . Center for Mark Twain Studies . en-US.
  18. Web site: 2022 Quarry Farm Fellows . 2022-06-16 . Center for Mark Twain Studies . 11 January 2022 . en-US.
  19. News: 2008-07-12 . The Trouble Begins at 8 . en-US . Wall Street Journal . 2022-06-16 . 0099-9660.
  20. Web site: The Trouble Begins Archives . 2022-06-16 . Center for Mark Twain Studies . 3 November 2016 . en-US.
  21. Web site: Mark Twain Quadrennial Conference Elmira College . 2022-06-16 . www.elmira.edu.
  22. Web site: Past Quadrennial Conferences and Symposia . 2022-06-16 . Center for Mark Twain Studies . 24 July 2019 . en-US.
  23. Howe . Lawrence . 2020 . The Editor's Drawers . Studies in American Humor . 6 . 1 . 1–4 . 10.5325/studamerhumor.6.1.0001 . 243344453 . 2333-9934.
  24. Web site: Summer Teachers Institute . 2022-06-16 . Center for Mark Twain Studies . 17 July 2020 . en-US.
  25. Web site: The American Vandal Podcast . 2022-06-16 . Center for Mark Twain Studies . 13 November 2020 . en-US.
  26. Web site: CMTS Staff . 2022-06-16 . Center for Mark Twain Studies . 19 October 2016 . en-US.

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