The Innocents Abroad Mark Twain - Fully entitled The Innocents Abroad, or the New Pilgrims Progress, Twains colorful travelogue is a compilation of the newspaper articles he wrote while on a cruise to Europe, Egypt, and the Holy Land with other American tourists in 1867. His account frequently uses humor to describe the people and places he visits, although this becomes highly satiric at times as Twain becomes frustrated with European profiteering, a pointless historical anecdote in Gibraltar, and the overly institutionalized nature of countries like Italy. Where he critiques, however, he also feels a strange reverence, as in the Canary Islands and the Holy Land. A more serious theme also flows through Twains experience. Twain sees the conflict between history and the modern world as he travels with his New World compatriots through the lands of ancient civilizations, ultimately discovering that you cant believe everything you read in travel guidebooks. This landmark work finds Twain searching for the American identity as it increasingly casts its shadow over the world of Old Europe.

Mark Twain, the writer, adventurer and wily social critic born Samuel Clemens, wrote the novels 'Adventures of Tom Sawyer' and 'Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.' Who Was Mark Twain? Mark Twain, whose real name was Samuel Clemens, was the celebrated author of several novels, including two major classics of American literature: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. He was also a riverboat pilot, journalist, lecturer, entrepreneur and inventor.