"Life on The Mississippi" Excerpt (Text-Analysis Response)

 "Life on The Mississippi" Excerpt  In Mark Twain's excerpt from the classic novel Life on the Mississippi, Mark Twain stated the metaphor "The face of the water (Mississippi River), in time, became a wonderful book - a book that was a dead language to the uneducated passenger, but which told its mind to me without reserve." In this metaphor, Mark Twain compares the Mississippi River to a book that everyday passengers cannot comprehend, but a seasoned steamboat pilot, such as himself, can.

To the average steamboat passenger the language of the river is merely invisible, cloaked by a beautiful scene of landscape which they heed no attention to. To a seasoned steamboat pilot the language of the river reveals secrets, hidden in plain sight, only to be found by the trained of eye. When a passenger sees a solitary log floating in the water, "black and conspicuous", they see just that, a log and nothing more. But when the steamboat pilot sees a floating log he may think to himself "that floating log means that the river is rising". Traveling further along, a passenger sees "a broad expanse of the river was turning to blood; in the middle distance the red hue brightened to gold" and nothing further, just a photo worthy sunset. The steamboat pilot sees the same scene, but thinks differently in that "this sun means that we are going to have wind to-morrow" because he is accustomed to the "dead language" of the "wonderful book" that is the Mississippi River.

An average passenger will see that the shore is densely wooded, "and the sombre shadow that fell from this forest was broken in one place, by a long, ruffled trail that shone like silver" and yet think nothing of it other than it to be exemplary scenery. An adept steamboat pilot however will look at the exact forest scene and think to himself "that silver streak in the shadow of the forest is the 'break' from a new snag, and has located himself in the very best place he could have found to fish for steamboats" seeing the dangers the river shows. Passengers seeing "high above the forest wall a clean-stemmed dead tree waved a single leafy bough that glowed like a flame in the unobstructed splendor that was flowing from the sun" not knowing the secrets and meaning it held to the river. The steamboat pilot, however, knows the secrets and meaning the dead tree holds thinking "that tall dead tree, with the single, living branch, is not going to last long, and then how is a body ever going to get the, through this blind place at night twitching a friendly old landmark?"

Mark Twain uses metaphors to compare the river to a book that is "not a book to be read once and thrown aside, for it had a new story to tell everyday" to show the ever changing river. Only seasoned steamboat pilots can read the "wonderful book" and ascertain all its secrets that are hiding in plain sight. One cannot take their eyes off the river for even a second in fear they might miss a very crucial, life determining sign the river shows without possibly facing horrid consequences. As Mark Twain stated, in short, as important as knowing and comprehending the language and signs of the constantly changing river are, one does lose the sense of beauty when viewing the "majestic river". After accustoming oneself to the language, they are no longer able to see as the average steamboat passenger does, only as the steamboat pilot does, forever mindlessly reading the river without grasping the full allurement of the Mississippi River as they once did. The river is teeming with dangerously beautiful scenes of landscape, pleasing to the eye, but fatal to the vessel and its occupants.

- Tronlegacy2000 (talk)