''Roughing It'' is a book of semi- autobiographical travel literature by

Mark Twain Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, entrepreneur, publisher, and lecturer. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has p ...

. It was written in 1870–71 and published in 1872, as a prequel to his first travel book '' The Innocents Abroad'' (1869). ''Roughing It'' is dedicated to Twain's mining companion Calvin H. Higbie, later a civil engineer who died in 1914. The book follows the travels of young Mark Twain through the American West during the years 1861–1867. After a brief stint as a Confederate cavalry militiaman (not included in the account), he joined his brother Orion Clemens, who had been appointed Secretary of the Nevada Territory, on a

stagecoach A stagecoach is a four-wheeled public transport coach used to carry paying passengers and light packages on journeys long enough to need a change of horses. It is strongly sprung and generally drawn by four horses although some versions are draw ...

journey west. Twain consulted his brother's diary to refresh his memory and borrowed heavily from his active imagination for many stories in the book. ''Roughing It'' illustrates many of Twain's early adventures, including a visit to Salt Lake City, gold and silver prospecting, real-estate speculation, a journey to the

Kingdom of Hawaii The Hawaiian Kingdom, or Kingdom of Hawaiʻi ( Hawaiian: ''Ko Hawaiʻi Pae ʻĀina''), was a sovereign state located in the Hawaiian Islands. The country was formed in 1795, when the warrior chief Kamehameha the Great, of the independent island ...

, and his beginnings as a writer. This memoir provides examples of Twain's rough-hewn humor, which would become a staple of his writing in such later books as '' Adventures of Huckleberry Finn'' (1884), '' The Adventures of Tom Sawyer'' (1876), and '' A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court'' (1889).

In popular culture

U.S. astronauts Frank Borman and Jim Lovell read ''Roughing It'' aloud to pass the time aboard NASA's Gemini VII, a 14-day-long Earth orbital mission in December 1965. In '' Lords of St. Thomas'', a 2018 historical novel set in

St. Thomas, Nevada St. Thomas, Nevada is a ghost town in Clark County, Nevada, near where the Muddy River flows into the Colorado River. St. Thomas was purchased by the US Federal Government and abandoned as the waters of Lake Mead submerged the town in the 1930 ...

, the main character "Little" Henry Lord is reading ''Roughing It'' when he learns that his father has fallen from the

Hoover Dam Hoover Dam is a concrete arch-gravity dam in the Black Canyon of the Colorado River, on the border between the U.S. states of Nevada and Arizona. It was constructed between 1931 and 1936 during the Great Depression and was dedicated on Se ...

Adaptations

Various sections of ''Roughing It'' were borrowed by television series such as ''

Bonanza ''Bonanza'' is an American Western television series that ran on NBC from September 13, 1959, to January 16, 1973. Lasting 14 seasons and 432 episodes, ''Bonanza'' is NBC's longest-running western, the second-longest-running western series on U ...

''. In 1960, an hour-long adaptation was broadcast on NBC starring Andrew Prine and James Daly. A four-hour 2002 mini-series adaptation was broadcast on Hallmark Channel. Directed by Charles Martin Smith, it starred James Garner as an elderly Samuel Clemens and Robin Dunne as a young Clemens. ''Roughing It'' recounts midway through the book that a rich "blind lead" gold strike was discovered and claimed by a partnership of Twain, Calvin Higbie, and a mine foreman A.D. Allen, giving them well-founded hopes of being millionaires. To establish a claim, it was required that any or all of the claimants do a reasonable amount of work on the claimed strike within ten days. Due to chance happenings and failed communications between the three, the work requirement was left unfulfilled, and the forfeited but rich claim was quickly seized by others ten days after it was discovered. In the dedication of the book, Twain refers to Higbie as an "Honest Man, a Genial Comrade, and a Steadfast Friend … dedicated in Memory of the Curious Time When We Two Were Millionaires for Ten Days". The prospecting story is also covered in a 1968 episode of the syndicated television anthology series '' Death Valley Days'', hosted by Robert Taylor. In the television dramatization, Tom Skerritt plays Twain, and Dabney Coleman was cast as Higbie.

Notes

External links

* * * * Text plus additional background material. * {{Authority control 1872 books Books by Mark Twain Latter Day Saints in popular culture American travel books American frontier American autobiographies