Mark Twain
This companion site to Ken Burns’ film tells the story of Mark Twain through the metaphor of one of his more famous inventions: a self-pasting scrapbook.
Ernest Hemingway said, “All of American literature began with Huck Finn.” This project focuses on the man that inspired some of the greatest American fiction-writing of this century: Mark Twain. Born in the year of Halley’s comet in 1835, and exiting the earth with it in 1910, Twain’s life was always at the forefront of cultural change, whether it was dealing with race in American culture, riverboat piloting, traveling the world on lecture circuits, or patenting his many inventions. This site serves as a companion to the documentary film by Ken Burns/Florentine Films and is hosted on PBS Online. In addition to learning about the life of Twain via the Scrapbook, visitors can go behind-the-scenes in the making of the film, find related classroom activities, and link to more writings and resources. Inspired by Twain’s invention, the interactive scrapbook tells Twain’s life story through a collection of texts, photos, illustrations, and clippings from his day, plus audio and video clips from the film. The site design is both simple and playful, using motifs and fonts inspired by Twain’s books and illustrations from his time period. The Scrapbook section uses Twain’s scrapbook design as the basis for the background. The images, quotes, and icons are purposefully arranged as one would arrange a scrapbook: thematically and by time and place.