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Tom Sawyer
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Not counting The Gilded Age, which was co-authored with Charles Dudley Warner, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer was Mark Twain's first novel. By the time MT died, it had become an American classic, and it remains perhaps the best-loved of all his books among general readers. When it first came out in 1876... it was comparatively a failure. Despite MT's determination "that Tom shall outsell any previous book of mine," the American Publishing Co. sold less than 24,000 copies in the book's first year (compared, for example, to 70,000 for Innocents Abroad in a comparable period). As an imaginative act, Tom Sawyer led directly on to the greatness of Huckleberry Finn and MT's other fictions of childhood or the Mississippi valley. As a commercial disaster, it pushed MT in the direction that would lead him to create his own publishing company.
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Before coming to Congress, Tom Sawyer was the Mayor of the City of Akron, Ohio. Elected in 1983, he was the first Democrat to win election as Akron's mayor in 20 years. As mayor, he set a new course for the city's economic growth. He restructured the City's fiscal reporting systems; improved the delivery of municipal services; strengthened police, fire and paramedic forces; and balanced the City's budget all without raising taxes. In addition, as Mayor, Sawyer restored the City's borken and financially troubled Recycle Energy System. He reorganized its $43 million debt, restored service and saved taxpayers over $80 million in long-term debt.
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One of America’s best-loved tales, Tom Sawyer has a double appeal. First, it appeals to the young adolescent as the exciting adventures of a typical boy during the mid-nineteenth century, adventures that are still intriguing and delightful because they appeal to the basic instincts of nearly all young people, regardless of time or culture. Second, the novel appeals to the adult reader who looks back on his or her own childhood with fond reminiscences. In fact, in his preface to the first edition, Twain wrote, “Although my book is intended mainly for the entertainment of boys and girls el part of my plan has been to pleasantly remind adults of what they once were themselves, and what they felt and thought.” Thus, the novel is a combination of the past and the present, of the well-remembered events from childhood told in such a way as to evoke remembrances in the adult mind.
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Tom Sawyer is quite typical of the thousands of men who came to the West during the Gold Rush. He settled in San Francisco and held several jobs and minor political positions. He would have died in relative obscurity except that he is reputed to have known Samuel Clemens when the author was a reporter for the “Daily Morning Call” newspaper, writing under the name Mark Twain. Twain is supposed to have named his book, “Tom Sawyer” after his San Francisco acquaintence. Twain scholars, including Barbara Schmidt of Tarleton University have been unable to verify any claim that Mark Twain named his book for this particular Tom Sawyer.
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Mark Twain's publication in 1876 of his popular novel The Adventures of Tom Sawyer reversed a brief downturn in his success following the publication of his previous novel, The Gilded Age. Twain wrote The Adventures of Tom Sawyer while he and his family were living in Hartford, Connecticut, and while Twain was enjoying his fame. The novel, which tells of the escapades of a young boy and his friends in St. Petersburg, Missouri, a village near the Mississippi River, recalls Twain's own childhood in a small Missouri town. The friendship of Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn is one of the most celebrated in American literature, built on imaginative adventures, shared superstitions, and loyalty that rises above social convention. Twain's American reading audience loved this novel and its young hero, and the novel remains one of the most popular and famous works of American literature. The novel and its characters have achieved folk hero status in the American popular imagination.
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The Adventures of Tom Sawyer is based on the classic story by Mark Twain. Tom's adventures begin with a whitewashed fence, a sweet girl named Becky, Huckleberry Finn, and tales of pirating and treasure hunting. Only after a surprising funeral and a murder trial where the truth is uncovered does the audience see Tom not only as an adventurer but ... as a moral hero. Join BCT to share in lessons of bravery, truth, and adventure where Tom meets his match and mischievous fun begins...Tom Sawyer style.
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Tom Sawyer