The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County is an 1867 collection of short stories by Mark Twain. Twain's first book, it collects 27 stories that were previously published in magazines and newspapers. The title story first appeared in print in 1865 and has also been published as "The Notorious Jumping Frog of Calaveras County" and "Jim Smiley and His Jumping Frog." In it, the narrator retells a story he heard from a bartender, Simon Wheeler, at the Angels Hotel in Angels Camp, California, about the gambler Jim Smiley. Twain describes him: "If he even seen a straddle bug start to go anywheres, he would bet you how long it would take him to get to—to wherever he going to, and if you took him up, he would foller that straddle bug to Mexico but what he would find out where he was bound for and how long he was on the road."
Publication history
Twain first wrote the title short story at the request of his friend Artemus Ward, for inclusion in an upcoming book. Twain worked on two versions but neither was satisfactory to him—neither got around to describing the jumping frog contest. Ward pressed him again, but by the time Twain devised a version he was willing to submit, that book was already nearing publication, so Ward sent it instead to the Saturday Press, where it appeared in the November 18, 1865 edition as "Jim Smiley and His Jumping Frog." Twain's colorful story was immensely popular, and was soon printed in many different magazines and newspapers. Twain developed the idea further, and Bret Harte published this version in The Californian on December 16; this time entitled "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County," and the man named Smiley was changed to Greeley.
Further popularity of the tale led Twain to use the story to anchor his own first book which appeared in 1867, with a first issue run of only 1,000 copies. In the book version, Twain changed Greeley back to Smiley. Later, after 1872, a version appeared which changed the title word "celebrated" to "notorious."
Table of Contents
The book contains twenty-seven short stories and sketches.
- "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County"
- "Aurelia's Unfortunate Young Man"
- "A Complaint about Correspondents, Dated in San Francisco"
- "Answers to Correspondents"
- "Among the Fenians"
- "The Story of the Bad Little Boy Who Didn't Come to Grief"
- "Curing a Cold"
- "An Inquiry about Insurances"
- "Literature in the Dry Diggings"
- "'After' Jenkins"
- "Lucretia Smith's Soldier"
- "The Killing of Julius Caesar 'Localized'"
- "An Item which the Editor Himself could not Understand"
- "Among the Spirits"
- "Brief Biographical Sketch of George Washington"
- "A Touching Story of George Washington's Boyhood"
- "A Page from a Californian Almanac"
- "Information for the Million"
- "The Launch of the Steamer Capital"
- "Origin of Illustrious Men"
- "Advice for Good Little Girls"
- "Concerning Chambermaids"
- "Remarkable Instances of Presence of Mind"
- "Honored as a Curiosity in Honolulu"
- "The Steed 'Oahu'"
- "A Strange Dream"
- "Short and Singular Rations"
Plot summary of the story
The narrator is sent on an errand to visit an old man, Simon Wheeler by a friend to find an old acquaintance of his. This is clearly a joke, because once the narrator gets there and asks about the acquaintance, Wheeler immediately begins to tell a long, droll story about Jim Smiley.
Jim Smiley is addicted to gambling. He bets on anything from the death of Parson Walker's wife to fights between his bulldog pup, Andrew Jackson, and other dogs. One day, a stranger to the town agrees to bet on a frog jumping higher than Jim's frog, Dan'l Webster. When Jim is not looking, the stranger pours lead bullets into the frog's mouth, weighing it down so that he wins the bet.
At this point in the story, Wheeler is called by someone on the front porch. When his attention is turned, the narrator makes his leave.
Upon discovering a French translation of this story, Twain re-translated the story, word for word and keeping the French grammar structure, back into English. He then published all three versions under the title "The Jumping Frog: in English, then in French, and then Clawed Back into a Civilized Language Once More by Patient, Unremunerated Toil".
Adaptation
Lukas Foss composed The Jumping Frog of Calaveras County , an opera in two scenes with libretto by Jean Karsavina, based on Twain's story. The opera premiered on May 18 , 1950 , at Indiana University.
The story was also adapted as a scene in The Adventures of Mark Twain , in which Mark Twain retells the story in short to Tom Sawyer, Huck Finn and Becky Thatcher.
References
- ^ Twain, Mark (1867). The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County . New York: C.H. Webb. pp. copyright page.
- ^ a b Twainquotes.com. Mark Twain in The Californian , 1864–1867. Retrieved on July 28, 2009.
- ^ Twain, Mark (1867). The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County . New York: C.H. Webb. pp. table of contents.
- ^ The Jumping Frog: in English, then in French, and then Clawed Back into a Civilized Language Once More by Patient, Unremunerated Toil
- ^ The Jumping Frog Of Calaveras County
See also
- Frog jumping
External links
- Online text at the Electronic Text Center at the University of Virginia Library
- Stephen Railton's Mark Twain in His Times project
- Mark Twain Boyhood Home &
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