Abstract
Abstract Twain's unfinished essay on William Clark Russell's Wreck of the Grosvenor (1877) was intended as a follow-up to “Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offenses.” In topic and content, Twain's Grosvenor essay recontextualizes how we read its famous predecessor. Unlike the Cooper essay—so often framed by textbooks as an American-centric statement on literary values—Twain's essay on Russell targets a still-living English writer and highly praises his compositions. Moreover, Russell wrote in a genre (the sea narrative) that, as oceanic studies scholars have suggested, decenters nationalism. Twain enjoyed Russell's naval fiction throughout his life, evinced by journal entries, letters, and an aborted burlesque of sea stories. Ultimately, Twain's genuine admiration for Russell's work made it hard for him muster the same comedic vitriol for British sea narratives that he did for Cooper's historical novels.
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