Hur man får folk att måla plank!

Känner ni till en kille som hette Samuel Langhorne Clements?

Han gick vanligen under det mera bekanta namnet Mark Twain. Som ångbåtslots på Mississippifloden inhämtade Twain rikligt med material till sina sedermera odödliga verk om Huck Finn, Tom Sawyer, Indian-Joe m fl.

Twain var också kommentarernas och aforismernas okrönte mästare. Vass i truten som en gammal badmadam plitade han ner tankar om det mesta:

"The exquisitely bad is as satisfying to the soul as the exquisitely good," skrev han och fortsatte: "Only the mediocre is unendurable."

Vem minns inte hur han lät tant Pollys bestraffning av Toms kaksnattande förvandlas till en lukrativ affär för den högst densamme. Jag pratar om när Tom tvingades måla tant Pollys plank och sedan galant upplät måleriet till traktens barn… och aningslösa.

En mindre känd del av Twains förmågor har nu återupptäckts på ett liten bibliotek i Redding, Conneticut, USA där Twain levde en tid. Ett hundratal av hans privata böcker av andra författare finns där med rikliga kommentarer och noteringar.

Hans favorit poet Robert Brownings dikter som han brukade läsa högt ur finns där med understrykningar och kommentarer liksom en lång rad andra verk ur vår litteraturhistoria bl a kanske något förvånande Koranen.

Det är möjligt att unga människor inte läser Twain nuförtiden. Men det borde de. Han är både rolig och bra och hans berättelser har fortfarande efter mer än hundra år massor att säga till mänskligheten om dess små och stora egenheter.

Som litteraturkritiker sparade han inte på krutet. Melville Landons ”Saratoga 1901” avfärdade han som ”The Droolings of an Idiot” Ungefär ”En Idiots Saglande”.

Å andra sidan kunde hans ormlika skrivstil också formulera uppskattning när verken föll honom på läppen.

Men jag kan bara inte hålla mig i dessa förvalstider:

"Say, Tom, let ME whitewash a little."

Tom considered, was about to consent; but he altered his mind:

"No--no--I reckon it wouldn't hardly do, Ben. You see, Aunt Polly's
awful particular about this fence--right here on the street, you know
--but if it was the back fence I wouldn't mind and SHE wouldn't. Yes,
she's awful particular about this fence; it's got to be done very
careful; I reckon there ain't one boy in a thousand, maybe two
thousand, that can do it the way it's got to be done."

"No--is that so? Oh come, now--lemme just try. Only just a little--I'd
let YOU, if you was me, Tom."

"Ben, I'd like to, honest injun; but Aunt Polly--well, Jim wanted to
do it, but she wouldn't let him; Sid wanted to do it, and she wouldn't
let Sid. Now don't you see how I'm fixed? If you was to tackle this
fence and anything was to happen to it--"

"Oh, shucks, I'll be just as careful. Now lemme try. Say--I'll give
you the core of my apple."

"Well, here--No, Ben, now don't. I'm afeard--"

"I'll give you ALL of it!"

Tom gave up the brush with reluctance in his face, but alacrity in his
heart. And while the late steamer Big Missouri worked and sweated in
the sun, the retired artist sat on a barrel in the shade close by,
dangled his legs, munched his apple, and planned the slaughter of more
innocents. There was no lack of material; boys happened along every
little while; they came to jeer, but remained to whitewash. By the time
Ben was fagged out, Tom had traded the next chance to Billy Fisher for
a kite, in good repair; and when he played out, Johnny Miller bought in
for a dead rat and a string to swing it with--and so on, and so on,
hour after hour. And when the middle of the afternoon came, from being
a poor poverty-stricken boy in the morning, Tom was literally rolling
in wealth. He had besides the things before mentioned, twelve marbles,
part of a jews-harp, a piece of blue bottle-glass to look through, a
spool cannon, a key that wouldn't unlock anything, a fragment of chalk,
a glass stopper of a decanter, a tin soldier, a couple of tadpoles, six
fire-crackers, a kitten with only one eye, a brass doorknob, a
dog-collar--but no dog--the handle of a knife, four pieces of
orange-peel, and a dilapidated old window sash."(Ur Mark Twains Tom Sawyer)