The Chicago of Europe

A collection of travel yarns, in America and abroad, that only the great humorist could spin.With a sharp eye and an even sharper wit, Mark Twain is the quintessential tour guide to nineteenth-century America and beyond. Dispatches showcasing his caustic, gimlet-eyed humor will take readers on a trot around the globe, from Hawaii to the Holy Land to Berlin ("e;Europe's Chicago"e;), and, of course, along the Mississippi River.This delicious assemblage of 68 tales features Twain's trademark style-a combination of breezy insouciance and droll barbarism-at its very best."e;Wandering around exotic places and among foreign people gives [Twain] the ideal opportunity to be his uniquely engaging self-not quite an innocent or a tramp but a curious, clear-eyed and totally American chronicler abroad: totally game, bewitched and appalled, funny and astounded."e; -Kurt Andersen, New York Times-bestselling author of Evil Geniuses