ABSTRACT
The art of humorous story-telling is, according to Mark Twain, a distinctly American creation. 'The basis of this art,' he says, 'is to string incongruities and absurdities together in a wandering and sometimes purposeless way and seem innocently unaware that they are absurdities.' It is, it seems to me, with some such defmition as this in mind that we have accustomed ourselves to refer to him as the 'great American humorist.' From the popular point of view he has defined his own work to a nicety. For nearly half a century we have accepted and approved the label. He is the great American humorist. But he is more than that. And so clearly is this the case that were the contrary true more than a good half of his work, at the least estimate, could never have been written.
