The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County by Mark Twain - Essay Example

“The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” by Mark Twain “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County”is a famous short story by Mark Twain that was considered to be the best creation of humoristic literature written in America by the moment of its first publication. This story made Mark Twain famous, because it already reflected his unique humor that had been formed gradually in his previous stories. The humor of Mark Twain represents unique and at the same time real American fictional phenomenon. Twain became uninterested in traditional American humor that attracted the attention of the people, who were not too unpretentious in literature. “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” is also full of grotesque, but it is also characterized by the skill to represent not only the funny episode, but the way the things are in whole world. This skill was developed by Mark Twain in every story that allowed him to become the best humorist of America. He tried to make his humorist story very much alike the common short story. It seemed that he took a common short story and just made it funny. It was necessary that the reader could see in the funny story the real American life described in detail. The story about the frog described by Twain is rather trustworthy. It was possible to hear it in the native country of Mark Twain and it was even published in newspapers. However, the frog became famous only in the short story by Twain. The hero of the story Jim Smiley is the humoristic embodiment of a typical American man. He is happy and lucky, he is sure that he will always win in his life. He likes to bet forgetting about natural rules of morality. Jim bets if he is sure that he will win, thus he bets everywhere and on everything, even if the things he bets on are not proper for this kind of action “he was always making money on anything that turned up if he could get anybody to try to make money on the other side.  And if he could not do that, he would change sides” (Twain). Mark Twain uses grotesque to reflect his thoughts about such kind of attitude towards people. Maybe, there is nothing bad in betting on sport or some events. But it is absolutely immoral to bet on someone’s health or possible death. Twain shows his attitude towards such bets describing the illness of Walker’s wife: “Smiley asked him how was his wife, and he said she was better, thank God. And Smiley, before he thought, says, "Well, Ill risk my money she will not get well”” (Twain). The end of the successful betting was rather predictable. An honest man, who honestly bet over any possible things wanted to have one more successful deal. He honestly trained his frog to jump and wanted to have only honest competitions. Smiley, a rather good guy, who just forgot about some moral principles of humans, met a stranger, who was not so “good and honest”. A stranger proposed a bet to him and kind-hearted Jim decided to help him catch a frog for the competition. He was sure that he will win: “And he was lucky, uncommon lucky. He most always was a winner” (Twain.) While Jim was catching the frog for the stranger, he put lead shot into the famous frog’s mouth. Certainly, the frog could not jump after that and the stranger won the competition: “The new frog jumped.  Dan'l just lifted up his body but could not move at all. He was planted like a building.  Smiley was very surprised and angry too.  But he did not know what the problem was” (Twain). As Jim was a very honest guy, he gave the money to the stranger and was unpleasantly surprised, when found out the truth. Mark Twain created the character of Jim Smiley in order to show the life of people in the society he lived in. Good and wealthy life was the top priority for these people. They wanted to work, have pleasure from their work and be happy earning money. They were good and honest guys and sometimes defenseless before some individuals, who wanted to earn money using dishonest ways. Twain deliberately makes this guy “a stranger” to show that typical Americans were successful earning money honestly and they were really defenseless before others, who had no opportunity to do that, thus chose dishonest ways to get some money. Americans are showed as good and honest, but Mark Twain uses grotesque in order to show their drawbacks. Unfortunately, many of them lost the feeling of compassion. This usually happens, when people remain successful for a long period of some. They become hard-hearted and, what is the most upsetting, they even do not realize that. Mark Twain shows that by creating the character of a narrator. A narrator is an embodiment of a typical old American man “he was fat and bald-headed, and had an expression of wining gentleness and simplicity upon his tranquil countenance. He roused up and gave me good-day” (Twain). He is telling his stories without any emotions, being absolutely agnostic to what his is telling about. He just wants to tell the stories and nothing else: “Simon Wheeler forced me into a corner with his chair and began telling me this long story. He never smiled, he never frowned, he never changed his voice. But all through the endless story there was a feeling of great seriousness and honesty.  This showed me plainly that he thought the heroes of the story were men of great intelligence” (Twain). “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” is not just a humoristic story, it is a representation of the life of the whole society, relations between people, their goals, their characters and the lessons the life presents them with. Mark Twain’s skill is traced in every line of the story Mark Twain managed to apply humoristic skill to show the realities of the American society he lived in. Works Cited Twain, Mark. “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” Twain Library,1986. Web Read More