A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's CourtUniversity of California Press, 21 juin 2002 - 496 pages A Connecticut Yankee is Mark Twain’s most ambitious work, a tour de force with a science-fiction plot told in the racy slang of a Hartford workingman, sparkling with literary hijinks as well as social and political satire. Mark Twain characterized his novel as "one vast sardonic laugh at the trivialities, the servilities of our poor human race." The Yankee, suddenly transported from his native nineteenth-century America to the sleepy sixth-century Britain of King Arthur and the Round Table, vows brashly to "boss the whole country inside of three weeks." And so he does. Emerging as "The Boss," he embarks on an ambitious plan to modernize Camelot—with unexpected results. Daniel Carter Beard illustrated the first edition of Yankee in 1889, and Mark Twain praised his work as "better than the book—which is a good deal for me to say, I reckon." This Mark Twain Library edition reprints the text based on the author’s manuscript, all 221 of Beard’s illustrations, and the notes from the California scholarly edition. |
Table des matières
A Word of Explanation | 1 |
Camelot | 10 |
King Arthurs Court | 14 |
Knights of the Table Round | 22 |
Sir Dinadan the Humorist | 30 |
An Inspiration | 36 |
The Eclipse | 44 |
Merlins Tower | 52 |
A Competitive Examination | 238 |
The First Newspaper | 252 |
The Yankee and the King Travel Incognito | 264 |
Drilling the King | 274 |
The SmallPox Hut | 282 |
The Tragedy of the Manor House | 290 |
Marco | 302 |
Dowleys Humiliation | 312 |
The Boss | 62 |
The Tournament | 72 |
Beginnings of Civilization | 80 |
The Yankee in Search of Adventures | 88 |
Slow Torture | 98 |
Freemen | 106 |
Defend thee Lord | 118 |
Sandys Tale | 126 |
Morgan le Fay | 138 |
A Royal Banquet | 148 |
In the Queens Dungeons | 160 |
KnightErrantry as a Trade | 174 |
The Ogres Castle | 180 |
The Pilgrims | 190 |
The Holy Fountain | 204 |
Restoration of the Fountain | 216 |
A Rival Magician | 226 |
SixthCentury Political Economy | 322 |
The Yankee and the King Sold as Slaves | 336 |
A Pitiful Incident | 350 |
An Encounter in the Dark | 360 |
An Awful Predicament | 366 |
Sir Launcelot and Knights to the Rescue | 376 |
The Yankees Fight with the Knights | 382 |
Three Years Later | 396 |
The Interdict | 406 |
War | 412 |
The Battle of the SandBelt | 426 |
A Postscript by Clarence | 442 |
REFERENCES | 451 |
EXPLANATORY NOTES | 455 |
NOTE ON THE TEXT | 477 |
Expressions et termes fréquents
Agravaine armor Arthur asked Beard began better Boss boys Camelot castle century Church Clarence Clemens cloth Connecticut Yankee damsel Daniel Carter Beard dead death Dowley dream Edited enchantment eyes face fact fair fair lord friends Guenever hand hang hath head heart Henry Nash Smith horse hundred Initial Letter Chapter kill King Arthur king's knew knights Lactantius ladies laugh Lecky live look lord magician Marco Mark Twain matter Merlin mind miracle monks Mordred Morgan le Fay never nobility noble Pellinore person poor pretty priest queen rest Robert Pack rode Sandy Sir Gareth Sir Gawaine Sir Kay Sir Launcelot Sir Lucan Sir Marhaus Sir Sagramour slave so-on sort spear stand stood sword talk tell thee thing thou thought told took trouble turned unto Valley of Holiness wages wanted woman wonder word