Mark Twain Quotes About Literature

• The more things are forbidden, the more popular they become.

  Mark Twain

  Literature, Forbidden Fruit, Forbidden Things

  Mark Twain (2012). “The Wit and Wisdom of Mark Twain: A Book of Quotations”, p.13, Courier Corporation

• It could probably be shown by facts and figures that there is no distinctly native criminal class except Congress.

  Mark Twain

  Class, Criminals, Literature

  Following the Equator ch. 8, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's New Calendar" (1897)

• When people do not respect us we are sharply offended; yet in his private heart no man much respects himself.

  Mark Twain

  Respect, Life Changing, Life Lesson

  1897 Following the Equator, ch.29.

• The most interesting information comes from children, for they tell all they know and then stop.

  Mark Twain

  Sweet, Children, Teaching

  Mark Twain (2014). “Mark Twain on Common Sense: Timeless Advice and Words of Wisdom from America's Most-Revered Humorist”, p.7, Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.

• My books are like water; those of the great geniuses are wine. (Fortunately) everybody drinks water.

  Mark Twain

  Book, Wine, Water

• Let us not be too particular; it is better to have old secondhand diamonds than none at all.

  Mark Twain

  Time, Advice, Literature

  Mark Twain (2000). “The Jumping Frog: And 18 Other Stories”, p.104, Book Tree

• Truth is the most valuable thing we have. Let us economize it.

  Mark Twain

  Truth, Literature, Valuable

  Following the Equator ch. 7, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's New Calendar" (1897) See Edmund Burke 25

• Be careless in your dress if you must, but keep a tidy soul.

  Mark Twain

  Neat And Tidy, Soul, Dresses

  "The Jumping Frog: And 18 Other Stories".

• The public is the only critic whose judgment is worth anything at all.

  Mark Twain

  Writing, Editors, Criticism

  "Life as I Find it".

• We Americans... bear the ark of liberties of the world.

  Mark Twain

  Liberty, Ark, Literature

• I have made it a rule never to smoke more than one cigar at a time.

  Mark Twain

  Funny, Smoking, Literature

  "The Jumping Frog: And 18 Other Stories".

• Wit is the sudden marriage of ideas which before their union were not perceived to have any relation.

  Mark Twain

  Ideas, Literature, Unions

  Mark Twain, Michael Barry Frank, Robert Pack Browning, Lin Salamo, Frederick Anderson, Mark Twain (1980). “Mark Twain's Notebooks & Journals, Volume III: (1883-1891)”, p.172, Univ of California Press

• Ideally a book would have no order to it, and the reader would have to discover his own.

  Mark Twain

  Book, Writing, Order

• What a wee little part of a person's life are his acts and his words! His real life is led in his head, and is known to none but himself.

  Mark Twain

  Real, Literature, Littles

  Mark Twain, Harriet Elinor Smith (2012). “Autobiography of Mark Twain: Reader's Edition”, p.44, Univ of California Press

• Everything human is pathetic. The secret source of humor itself is not joy but sorrow. There is no humor in heaven.

  Mark Twain

  Happiness, Humor, Joy

  Following the Equator ch. 10, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's New Calendar" (1897)

• Men think they think upon the great political questions, and they do; but they think with their party, not independently; they read its literature, but not that of the other side

  Mark Twain

  Party, Men, Thinking

  Mark Twain (1973). “What Is Man? and Other Philosophical Writings”, p.96, Univ of California Press

• It was wonderful to find America, but it would have been more wonderful to miss it.

  Mark Twain

  Funny, America, Missing

  Pudd'nhead Wilson conclusion, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" (1894)

• What, sir, would the people of the earth be without woman? They would be scarce, sir, almighty scarce.

  Mark Twain

  Women, People, Would Be

  Mark Twain (2014). “Mark Twain’s Letters & Speeches (Annotated Edition)”, p.1026, Jazzybee Verlag

• High and fine literature is wine, and mine is only water; but everybody likes water.

  Mark Twain

  Wine, Water, Likes

  Mark Twain (2004). “The Letters of Mark Twain”, p.30, 1st World Publishing

• Prosperity is the best protector of principle.

  Mark Twain

  Political, Principles, Literature

  Mark Twain, Caroline Thomas Harnsberger (2009). “Mark Twain at Your Fingertips: A Book of Quotations”, p.385, Courier Corporation

• Humor must not professedly teach and it must not professedly preach, but it must do both if it would live forever.

  Mark Twain

  Humor, Forever, Literature

  Mark Twain, Milton Meltzer (2002). “Mark Twain Himself: A Pictorial Biography”, p.151, University of Missouri Press

• In literature imitations do not imitate.

  Mark Twain

  Literature, Imitation

  Mark Twain (2012). “Mark Twain at Your Fingertips: A Book of Quotations”, p.246, Courier Corporation

• The Germans have an inhuman way of cutting up their verbs. Now a verb has a hard time enough of it in this world when it's all together. It's downright inhuman to split it up. But that's just what those Germans do. They take part of a verb and put it down here, like a stake, and they take the other part of it and put it away over yonder like another stake, and between these two limits they just shovel in German. from "Disappearance of Literature

  Mark Twain

  Cutting, Hard Times, Two

  Mark Twain (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Mark Twain (Illustrated)”, p.7281, Delphi Classics

• Literature is well enough, as a time-passer, and for the improvement and general elevation and purification of mankind, but it has no practical value.

  Mark Twain

  Literature, Improvement, Enough

  Mark Twain (1969). “Mark Twain's Correspondence with Henry Huttleston Rogers, 1893-1909”, p.386, Univ of California Press

• No man has an appreciation so various that his judgment is good upon all varieties of literary work.

  Mark Twain

  Appreciation, Men, Editors

  Mark Twain (2012). “Mark Twain at Your Fingertips: A Book of Quotations”, p.219, Courier Corporation

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