he knows and his experiences with slavery. If a woman is raped, then makes a successful career writing and lecturing on rape prevention do we accuse her of denigrating the crime? Race, Rape, and Lynching by Sandra Gunning offers the only no holds barred attack on Mark Twain in the UNLV library. She writes "even Mark Twain abided by certain tenets of white supremacy" without backing it with facts or citations (Gunning 12). Gunning feels that Twain possesses a "need to silence female utterance both black and white (Gunning 13)." This statement tends to make Twain out to be sexist more than racist. Gunning might benefit from researching Twain’s Why Not Abolish It in which Twain called for prison terms for the fathers of bastards (Budd Tales 552). The rest of her case consists of "Twain reaches for metaphors of malignant blackness similar to those subsequently developed and exploited by Thomas Dixon (Gunning 14)." This segues perfectly into this: When Mark Twain was living in Hartford, Conneticut, where Dr. Doane, was rector of an Episcopal Church, he went to hear the Clergyman’s best sermon. After it was over Mark approached the Doctor and said politely: "I have enjoyed your sermon this morning. I welcome it as I would an old friend. I have a book at home in my library that contains every word of it.""Why, that can’t be, Mr. Clemens," replied the rector. "All the same, it is so," insisted Mark. "Well, I certainly should like to see that book," rejoined the rector with dignity. "All right," replied Twain, "you shall have it," and the next morning Doctor Doane received with Mark Twain’s compliments a copy of Webster’s ‘Unabridged Dictionary! -Cyril Clemens (Clemens 16) Moral of this anecdote; it’s not the actual words, but their arrangement that matters. I suspect Gunning might also believe that the inventor of the pistol is liable for all handgun murders because they created a mechanism for explo...
