Марк Твен - Смешные рассказы [The Funny Stories]

Let me set down an instance of the comic method, using an anecdote which has been popular all over the world for twelve or fifteen hundred years. The teller tells it in this way:

In the course of a certain battle a soldier whose leg had been shot off begged another soldier who was hurrying by to carry him to the rear. As the generous soldier, shouldering the unfortunate, helped him through the battlefield. The bullets and cannon balls were flying in all directions, and one of the latter took the wounded man’s head off, though his companion failed to see it. Soon he was called out by an officer, who said:

“Where are you going with that carcass?”

“To the rear, sir — he’s lost his leg!”

“His leg? You mean his head.”

The soldier put down his burden, and stood looking down upon it in great perplexity. At length he said:

“It is true, sir, just as you have said.” Then after a pause he added, “BUT HE TOLD ME IT WAS HIS LEG!!!!!”

Here the narrator bursts into explosion after explosion of thunderous horse-laughter, repeating the last sentence from time to time through his shriekings and suffocatings.

It takes only a minute and a half to tell that in its comic-story form; and isn’t worth the telling, after all. Put into the humorous-story form it takes ten minutes, and is about the funniest thing I have ever listened to.

He tells it in the character of an old farmer who has just heard it for the first time, thinks it is unspeakably funny, and is trying to repeat it to a neighbor. But he can’t remember it; so he gets all mixed up and wanders helplessly round and round. He puts in some details that don’t belong in the tale; takes them out and puts in others that are just as useless; makes minor mistakes now and then and stops to correct them; remembers things which he forgot to put in in their proper place and goes back to put them in there; stops his story telling in order to try to recall the name of the soldier that was hurt, and finally remembers that the soldier’s name was not mentioned — and so on, and so on, and so on.

The teller is innocent and happy and pleased with himself, and has to stop every little while to keep from laughing; but his body shakes in a jelly-like way; and at the end of the ten minutes the audience have laughed until they are exhausted, and the tears are running down their faces.

The simplicity and innocence and sincerity of the old farmer are perfectly simulated, and the result is a performance which is charming. This is art — and fine and beautiful, and only an artist can master it.

To string absurdities together in a wandering and sometimes purposeless way, and seem innocently unaware that they are absurdities, is the basis of the American art, if my position is correct. Another feature is the fast mentioning of the point. A third is the dropping of an important remark apparently without knowing it, as if one where thinking aloud. The fourth and last is the pause.

The pause is an exceedingly important feature in any kind of story. It is a delicate thing; for it must be exactly the right length — no more and no less — or it fails of its purpose and makes trouble.

On the platform I used to tell a ghost story that had a pause in front of the final sentence, and that pause was the most important thing in the whole story. If I got it the right length precisely, I could say the finishing sentence with effect enough to make some impressible girl deliver a little yelp and jump out of her seat — and that was what I was after. This story was called “The Golden Arm,” and was told in this fashion. You can practice with it yourself — and mind you look out for the pause and get it right.

Once upon a time there was a mean man, and he lived in the prairie all alone by himself, except he had a wife. And she died, and he took her to the prairie and buried her. Well, she had a golden arm — all solid gold, from the shoulder down. He was mean; and that night he couldn’t sleep, because he wanted that golden arm so bad.

At midnight he couldn’t stand it no more; so he got up, he did, and took his lantern and dug her up and got the golden arm. He bent his head down and walked and walked and walked through the snow. Then all of a sudden he stopped (make a considerable pause here, and look startled, and take a listening attitude) and said: “What’s that?”

And he listened — and listened — and the wind said (set your teeth together and imitate the singsong of the wind), “Bzzz-z-zzz” — and then, way back where the grave was, he heard a VOICE! — he heard a voice all mixed up in the wind — he could hardly tell them apart — ”Bzzz — zzz — W-h-o — g-o-t — m-y — g-o-l-d-e-n ARM?” (You must begin to shiver violently now.)

And he began to shiver and said, “Oh, my! OH, my!” and the wind blew the lantern out, and the snow blew in his face, and he walked faster knee-deep in snow toward home, he was so scared — and pretty soon he heard the voice again, and (pause) it was coming AFTER him! „Bzzz — zzz — zzz W-h-o — g-o-t — m-y — g-o-l-d-e-n — ARM?“

When he got to the house, he rushed upstairs and jumped in the bed and covered up, head and ears, and lay there shivering and shaking — and then he hear it AGAIN! — and CLOSER! He heard (pause) — pat-pat-pat [14] pat — pat-pat — топ-топ-топ ( звук шагов ) — someone was COMING UPSTAIRS!

Then pretty soon he knew it was STANDING BY THE BED! (Pause.) Then — he knew it was BENDING DOWN OVER HIM. He could scarcely breathe! Then he felt something C-O-L-D! (Pause.)

Then the voice said, RIGHT AT HIS EAR — “W-h-o — g-o-t — m-y g-o-l-d-e-n ARM?” (You must wail it out; then you stare impressively into the face of the farthest-gone auditor — a girl, preferably. When the pause has reached exactly the right length, jump suddenly at that girl and yell, “YOU’VE got it!”)

If you’ve got the PAUSE right, she’ll give a dear little yelp and jump right out of her shoes. But you MUST get the pause right; and you will find it the most troublesome and uncertain thing you ever undertook.

Palace of Saint Nicholas in the Christmas Morning

My Dear Susy Clemens,

I have received and read all the letters which you and your little sister have written me… I can read your and your baby sister’s fantastic words without any trouble at all. But I had trouble with those letters which you dictated through your mother and the nurses. I am a foreigner and cannot read English writing well. You will find that I made no mistakes about the things which you and the baby ordered in your own letters — I went down your chimney at midnight when you were asleep and delivered them all myself — and kissed both of you, too… But… there were… one or two small orders which I could not accomplish.

There was a word or two in your mama’s letter which… I thought it was “a trunk full of doll’s clothes.” Is that it? I will call at your kitchen door about nine o’clock this morning to ask about it. But I must not see anybody and I must not speak to anybody but you. When the kitchen doorbell rings, George must be blindfolded and sent to the door. You must tell George he must walk on tiptoe and not speak — otherwise he will die someday. Then you must go up to the nursery and stand on a chair or the nurse’s bed and put your ear to the speaking tube that leads down to the kitchen. When I whistle through it, you must speak in the tube and say, “Welcome, Santa Claus!” Then I will ask whether it was a trunk you ordered or not. If you say it was, I shall ask you what color you want the trunk to be… and then you must tell me every single thing in detail which you want the trunk to have in. Then when I say “Good-bye and a merry Christmas to my little Susy Clemens,” you must say “Good-bye, good old Santa Claus, I thank you very much.” Then you must go down into the library and make George close all the doors that open into the main hall. Then everybody must keep still for a little while. I will go to the moon and get those things and in a few minutes I will come down the chimney in the hall — if it is a trunk you want…