While looking for an interesting perspective as to Mark Twain's pessimism later in his life, I happened upon an old book titled The Ordeal of Mark Twain, written by Van Wyck Brooks back in 1920. Leafing through it, I found it an interesting analysis of Twain's personality as filtered through the then-new trend of psychoanalysis. As interesting as it was, I still believe that Brooks may have been a little bit off in his conclusions.
To put it simply, his book is a challenge. It is not simply that it is a challenge to fully grasp Brook's analysis of the vagaries of Twain's persona, but it is a general challenge to the basic picture most of the public accepts as the true nature of Twain. In other words, Brooks attempts to explain the angry, older Twain in a new fresher (for 1920) way. While his argument is compelling, it does not completely ring true. That is not to say that it does not make one think. Quite the opposite- Brooks tends to think a little too much in parts.
The main concept in the book is that Twain's career was a tragedy- a tragedy for himself and a tragedy for the reading public at large. The two main villains in this particular tragedy are the typical Freudian scapegoats, Twain's wife and mother. According to Brooks, "His mother was more eager to have him good than to have him great; his wife wanted him to be a gentleman." It is Brooks" assertion that these two women took it upon themselves to "civilize" this naturally "wild" man, or, as Brooks terms him, "this lion." In doing so, he believes that they ruined Twain, robbing him of the vibrancy that was surely within him. Being forced to suppress this adventurousness, which in turn dulled down his works, created the literary "tragedy" which Brooks speaks of. As Brooks eloquently puts it, "Between them they tamed the lion and made him perform parlor tricks.".
It is then Brooks" supposition that Twain was not ignorant of this tragedy, and the frustration that it caused began to eat away at his subconscious.
