IMPORTANT NOTES: PLEASE be aware that if there is just ONE photo in our listings, it means it is a GENERIC STOCK PHOTO. 

Condition descriptions provided by eBay in their 'item specifics' template shown above my listings are sometimes incorrect due to limitations of the EBAY software listing program. [Data, including stock photos, is pulled in from outside resources automatically, to create these listings. sometimes that data may be incorrect, or cover art may be different.]

Product description One of the most renowned public speakers of his day, Mark Twain was often asked to give speeches to mark public holidays or important anniversaries, for school graduations, at banquets for distinguished visitors, and at events sponsored by charitable organizations, reform groups, and the like. Published a few months after his death, this wide-ranging collection of speeches, spanning more than four decades, covers the gamut of Mark Twain's interests. Here are speeches on women's rights, on cigars and billiards, and on the extension of the copyright law. We find occasional pieces, banquet toasts and introductions that, in addition to being amusing in themselves, provide a vivid glimpse of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century social rituals. Also present are some of Twain's most controversial and daring speeches, such as the notorious "Whittier Birthday" Speech, in which he poked fun at three giants of New England literary culture to the horror of his audience; and "The Babies," which closes with a memorable image of the guest of honor: an infant Ulysses S. Grant attempting to put his toe in his mouth.