A Pen Warmed-Up in Hell; Mark Twain in Protest
Edited by Frederick Anderson
This book is a collection of short essays and poems that Twain wrote in the later years of his life. Despite Twain's fame as one of America's most influential and prominent writers, the book was blacklisted by the US government during the Vietnam War because of its evaluations and challenging of US motives for involvement in the Spanish American War, specifically in conquest of the Philippines. This was over half a century after Twain's death. The book itself and the government's reaction thereto reflect problems that our country has been facing since it was itself a body of colonies and addresses issues that we are still confronted with today. The book also contains essays that express various perspectives about religion, philosophy, science fiction, and Twain's advocacy of an individualism founded in the lack of absolute knowledge that any one person can have of his or her self.