Dawidziak Mark - Mark Twains Guide to Diet, Exercise, Beauty, Fashion, Investment, Romance, Health and Happiness

Words of Praise

Nobody gets Mark Twain the way Mark Dawidziak does. Here is the master in all of his certainty, humor, and undertow. This book wonderfully underscores how contemporary Mark Twain is and always will be.

Ken Burns, director of the film Mark Twain and many more award-winning documentaries

Mark has got mighty dedicated to the restoration of Twain into our thinking and has pursued a trail of scholarship which led him to deeply research the man we so admire. We became friends early on when he covered theater and television for the Cleveland Plain Dealer, and have a mutual reverence and love for Mark Twains teeming, explosive mind. This is a collection of these explosions. I think you will enjoy them. I have enjoyed them for 60 years.

Hal Holbrook, actor

Mark Dawidziak is as comfy and entertaining a tour guide through the world of Mark Twain as Twain himself was a tour guide through the world. In other words, Mark Twains Guide is such a fun read that the only thing dry about it is the ink.

David Bianculli, television critic and guest host for NPRs Fresh Air

Copyright 2015 by Mark Dawidziak

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Published by Prospect Park Books

2359 Lincoln Avenue

Altadena, CA 91001

www.prospectparkbooks.com

Distributed by Consortium Books Sales & Distribution

www.cbsd.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Twain, Mark, 1835-1910.

Mark Twains guide to diet, exercise, beauty, fashion, investment, romance, health & happiness / edited by Mark Dawidziak.

pages cm

ISBN 978-1-938849-46-6

1. Twain, Mark, 1835-1910--Quotations. 2. Life--Quotations, maxims, etc. 3. Quotations, American. I. Dawidziak, Mark, 1956- editor. II. Title.

PS1303.D345 2015

818.409--dc23

2014041276

Design & layout by David Ter-Avanesyan/Ter33Design

CONTENTS

To Hal Holbrook, and, many times over, he knows why

T he maxim assures us that confession is good for the soul (or, if youve already purchased this book, lets hope its good for the sold). So, lets make a quick trip to the full-disclosure department. Theres something wrong with the title of this book: Mark Twains Guide to Diet, Exercise, Beauty, Fashion, Investment, Romance, Health, and Happiness. Its accurate, as far as it goes, but it doesnt go far enough. Its obviously too short. I realize that now. And the reader has my most humble apologies. It has been my intention from the outset to give you your moneys worth, and the title is short-changing the content in this volume. Yes, there are plenty of tips on diet, exercise, beauty, fashion, investment, etc. Yet youll also find guidance on politics, religion, parenting, and education, among other things. The advice flows freely, page after page, for as Mark Twain once observed, Information appears to stew out of me naturally... The more I caulk up the sources, the more I leak wisdom.

The phrase advice is cheap used to mean something in this country. When the proverb was coined, after all, coins went a lot further. Advice was cheap, and you got what you paid for. Then inflation hit, and the price of advice skyrocketed. While the shopworn phrase still was treated as common currency in the marketplace of ideas, the phrase had been rendered practically meaningless, worthless, bankrupt, almost a bitter sarcasm.

Most advice you encounter these days is as worthless as ever, but it sure isnt cheap. Ever walk into a lawyers office and ask for advice? Ever examine a bill after seeking a specialists medical advice? Seen a therapist lately? Was it cheap?

Ever enroll in an investment seminar? It probably was a terrific get-rich planfor the person giving the seminar. Ever feel taken after taking in one of those inspirational talks promising eternal bliss, peace, and happiness? The speaker undoubtedly left pretty happy. Ever sign up for one of those celebrity-endorsed diet plans? Chances are you were considerably lighter, all rightin the wallet.

As the dollar figure attached to advice has increased, so has the amount of it. There are countless self-help books published every year. There are infomercials coming at you from all directions on the TV landscape.

Im not in any way suggesting that the pop-culture woods are full of charlatans. Im not suggesting that at all. Im saying it outright. If all of this stuff was more than guff (thats the nice word for it), wed be the happiest, healthiest, wealthiest, slimmest, trimmest, least-stressed, best-adjusted, best-conditioned, best-natured, most-fashionable people imaginable. Beware the type of person Mark Twain described in his story The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg: He had only one vanity, he thought he could give advice better than any other person.

That person probably is a great believer in Twains suggestion, Nothing so needs reforming as other peoples habits. This breed undoubtedly also subscribes to a saying Twain included in Following the Equator: To be good is noble; but to show others how to be good is nobler and no trouble.

Thats not to say there arent honest, responsible, helpful sources of advice and inspiration. And if youve found one of those rare gems, Id be the last to question its promises.

This book makes no such promises, but it does offer a smile or two, and perhaps some common sense in the matter of seeking and taking advice. If any of this directly leads to you being happier, thats by design. If any of this directly leads to you being healthier, thats by mistake. Fair warning on this score: Twain cautions that strict adherence to this politically incorrect advice may kill you. But then again, you may die laughing just considering his mirthful maxims and wacky witticisms.

Although laced with a delightful and offbeat brand of wisdom, Twains advice runs contrary to almost every self-help book that has ever hit the bestseller lists. At the same time, as insane as much of this advice will seem, it brings some badly needed sanity to the discussion of advice and inspiration, diet and exercise, fashion and finance, politics and religion, parenting and childhood.

If you wish to know the spirit in which this advice is offered, consult Twains Seventieth Birthday speech, delivered at Delmonicos Restaurant in Manhattan on December 5, 1905: