Chasing the Last Laugh

Mark Twain's Raucous and Redemptive Round-the-World Comedy Tour

By: Richard Zacks

Narrated by: George Guidall

Length: 16 hrs and 37 mins

Publisher's summary

From Richard Zacks, bestselling author of Island of Vice and The Pirate Hunter, a rich and lively account of how Mark Twain’s late-life adventures abroad helped him recover from financial disaster and family tragedy—and revived his world-class sense of humor

Mark Twain, the highest-paid writer in America in 1894, was also one of the nation’s worst investors.

“There are two times in a man’s life when he should not speculate,” he wrote. “When he can’t afford it and when he can.” The publishing company Twain owned was failing; his investment in a typesetting device was bleeding red ink. After losing hundreds of thousands of dollars back when a beer cost a nickel, he found himself neck-deep in debt. His heiress wife, Livy, took the setback hard. “I have a perfect horror and heart-sickness over it,” she wrote. “I cannot get away from the feeling that business failure means disgrace.”

But Twain vowed to Livy he would pay back every penny. And so, just when the fifty-nine-year-old, bushy-browed icon imagined that he would be settling into literary lionhood, telling jokes at gilded dinners, he forced himself to mount the “platform” again, embarking on a round-the-world stand-up comedy tour. No author had ever done that. He cherry-picked his best stories—such as stealing his first watermelon and buying a bucking bronco—and spun them into a ninety-minute performance. Twain trekked across the American West and onward by ship to the faraway lands of Australia, New Zealand, Tasmania, India, Ceylon, and South Africa. He rode an elephant twice and visited the Taj Mahal. He saw Zulus dancing and helped sort diamonds at the Kimberley mines. (He failed to slip away with a sparkly souvenir.) He played shuffleboard on cruise ships and battled captains for the right to smoke in peace. He complained that his wife and daughter made him shave and change his shirt every day.

The great American writer fought off numerous illnesses and travel nuisances to circle the globe and earn a huge payday and a tidal wave of applause. Word of his success, however, traveled slowly enough that one American newspaper reported that he had died penniless in London. That’s when he famously quipped: “The report of my death was an exaggeration.”

Throughout his quest, Twain was aided by cutthroat Standard Oil tycoon H.H. Rogers, with whom he had struck a deep friendship, and he was hindered by his own lawyer (and future secretary of state) Bainbridge Colby, whom he deemed “head idiot of this century.”

In Chasing the Last Laugh, author Richard Zacks, drawing extensively on unpublished material in notebooks and letters from Berkeley’s ongoing Mark Twain Project, chronicles a poignant chapter in the author’s life—one that began in foolishness and bad choices but culminated in humor, hard-won wisdom, and ultimate triumph.

©2016 Richard Zacks (P)2016 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

"[A] colorful and fun read."—The Washington Post

"[D]ense in action and experience. . . . Chasing the Last Laugh brings Twain’s comedy close to its wider context, and enlivens both. By situating the writer in his world and his time, biography actually makes Mark Twain funnier.”—Flavorwire

"Not since Michael Shelden's spellbinding Mark Twain, Man in White: The Grand Adventure of His Final Years has such an impossible-to-put-down book emerged that yields fresh information about episodes in Twain's life on every page.... Zacks manages the nearly impossible feat of maintaining the momentum of his narrative while filling in the behind-the-scenes factors that add immeasurably to our grasp of the significance of each occurrence.... By committing to narrate only a portion of a pivotal decade--a biographical period often neglected except by scholars interested in Twain's growing distaste for the colonial imperialism he witnessed at firsthand--Zacks is able to explain many incidents with greater contextual background than any full-length biography can possibly allocate to them. The result is a joy to read and a lesson in what can be done to bring an era to life."—Mark Twain Journal

greater narrator, great story

This book had me annoying friends because I listened to it for two days straight. The narrator is one of the best I've heard. He also does the difficult book, Gravity's Rainbow.

As for the story, Mark Twain is someone I didn't know much about, but this book shared so much from journals and letters that now I feel like I somewhat know the man and his sense of humor. The perfect amount of historical facts and rich narritive. Very entertaining.

Mark Twain, always good company

Get to know Mark Twain more completely with this book. Well written; Well read Enjoy

Borrrrrrrrrrrring

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

Nope. The book is just nothing more than an extended travelogue. There is nothing extraordinary about Twain's tri that warranted a book or 16 hour listening experience.

How would you have changed the story to make it more enjoyable?

The story did not need to be told. However, if necessary, then the book should be significantly edited. I reckon 50% could be omitted.

Which scene was your favorite?

None in particular. However, Guidall's delivery made the book palatable.

Was Chasing the Last Laugh worth the listening time?

Nope. I invested a lot of time into this book and kept waiting for it to get good. My expectations were never realized.

Any additional comments?

None.

This is a must have...

What did you like best about Chasing the Last Laugh? What did you like least?

... if you are doing a Phd dissertation on Mark Twain.

If you are not, an abridged version of the abridged version is a better choice for you.

Would you be willing to try another book from Richard Zacks? Why or why not?

Yes, but give me a three or four year break first.

What does George Guidall bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

The weight of age.

Could you see Chasing the Last Laugh being made into a movie or a TV series? Who should the stars be?

No, but the, they make movies out of everything, so...

Delightful

As a lover of the travelogue I hoped this would be a perfect late in life foray into the world of Twain, and I was not disappointed! The numerous settings were brought to life and imbued with the wit and charm of Mr. Twain himself, resulting in a fine alchemy of a book that is both history, commentary, and biography. The performance by Mr. Guidall was perfect, with his change of voice transporting Twain directly into the comfortable chair right beside you - cigar in hand.

Everything works here

This book hits on all cylinders. Content and narration go together perfectly, even better than I anticipated. Which is saying something, as I'm a huge Guidall fan. But he outdoes himself with this. I almost felt like I was listening to Twain himself!

The Master Storyteller

In 1895 Mark Twain set off on a round the world speaking tour. The depression of the 1890s was in full force and Twain’s publishing company along with his investment in a new style of typesetting machine was forced into bankruptcy. His wife, Livy, took over the finances not only of her own estate but his also. Twain may have been the master storyteller but he was a terrible businessman. The world speaking tour was to help raise income to help them get out of debt. Mark Twain thought he would write a travel book about the trip to create more money. Mark Twain’s wife Livy and daughter Clara accompanied him on the trip. Daughters Suzy and Jean stayed home with an aunt. As the trip was nearing the end, Suzy came down with meningitis and died. I found it most interesting that after the trip Mark Twain received lots of admiration from the public not only for his writings and speeches but because he had paid his debts in full.

The book is well written and meticulously researched. Zacks used letters, newspaper accounts and Twain’s notebooks to tell the tale. The trip revived interest in Mark Twain’s books as well as make money to reduce his debt. I found this book a delight to read and learned more about the personal life of Mark Twain. I have read Mark Twain’s books as a child and an adult and enjoyed them and in many ways they provided me with a glimpse of life on the Mississippi in the 1800s. It is a shame that many places today have banned his books.

Zacks is a well known biographer and he does an excellent job in presenting Mark Twain’s trip and family life. George Guidall does an excellent job narrating the book. Guidall is probably the most famous of audiobook narrators and was one of the early pioneers of the field.

Well-researched, a great listen

Richard Zacks' book joins Michael Shelden's "Mark Twain: Man in White" as a unique and illuminating look at Twain's last years. It provides the most detailed account I've read yet of Twain's financial troubles and the world lecturing tour he undertook in an effort to pay his debts.

Twain himself wrote up that tour in his last travel book, "Following the Equator." (An excellent recording of that book, narrated by Michael Kevin, is available from Audible.) I'd read "Equator" years ago and thought I had a pretty good grasp of the details, but Zach's book is full of surprises. Many of them involve Twain's health. He spent much of the tour in agony from carbuncles, infected blisters that appeared on various parts of his body and resisted treatment. The accommodations were often cramped, mildewey, and infested with roaches. His discomfort was magnified by the presence of his wife Livy and daughter Clara, who came with him; two other daughters remained behind. Despite his physical torments, he forged ahead, driven as much by Livy's sense of honor as by his own sense of guilt.

He did succeed in paying most of his creditors in full, although Zachs - whose research is thorough and wide-ranging - digs out some documents indicating that one of them was shortchanged several thousand dollars. But it came at a terrible price for his family: when they arrived in England and were making preparations to return to America, they received news that their daughter Susy, who had stayed behind, was deathly ill. Twain received the news of her death by cable after Livy and Clara had already departed for the States: he had no way of letting them know what awaited them when they arrived. He spent months alone in England writing his promised book about the trip, trying to convey a jocular tone with only partial success.

"The Last Laugh" is a book that I started listening to in pieces but found myself eventually sitting and listening to for hours at a time. George Guidall's narration makes it easy to do this: there are fewer more soothing voices in the business.

Zacks includes a postscript that takes the story up to Twain's own death. It's a sad tale, but fortunately it's not the last word: Shelden's book provides a useful contrast to Zachs. If you're interested in Twain, I recommend reading them both.