Mark Twain’s Books Do Furnish a Room: But a Uniform Edition Does Still Better

Abstract

Believes that although many scholars and collectors have overlooked the Uniform Edition of Twain’s works, the extant set had important resonances for Samuel Clemens’ private anxieties and satisfactions and for Twain’s standing as a serious, enduring author of literature. Notes that the emphasis on uniformity Twain encouraged was essential to the format, contrasted with other editions tailored for the subscription trade. The Uniform texts catered to the current trend of designing books as visual artifacts to be displayed as markers of the owner’s cultural earnestness, and as domestic décor, revealing a pattern of the functions that books once served.