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Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain

The Mississippi River, with its silt-stained currents and ever-shifting channels, has long been both a lifeline and a legend in American imagination. When…

Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain
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Runtime: 14 hr 53 min · Watch the full audiobook on YouTube · Subscribe to Ion Books

The Mississippi River, with its silt-stained currents and ever-shifting channels, has long been both a lifeline and a legend in American imagination. When Mark Twain set out to chronicle his years as a steamboat pilot and his later return to a river transformed, he did more than document a place, he traced the pulse of a nation in flux. *Life on the Mississippi* is a river of words itself, winding between memoir and meditation, nostalgia and critique. It is a work that hums with the same energy as the steamboats Twain once navigated, carrying readers through the erosion of an era marked by ambition, folly, and the quiet triumph of time. Twain’s account is both personal and panoramic: a boy’s reverence for the river’s mysteries, a man’s reckoning with its decline.

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Public domain & narration

The edition shown here comes from Project Gutenberg, which publishes only books that are in the US public domain.

The narration is the LibriVox recording read by John Greenman. LibriVox volunteers dedicate their recordings to the public domain.

Ion Books adds the synchronized scrolling text and video, so you can read along while you listen, for free.

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Chapters

  1. Chapter 1: 01- The River and its History (15:10) · watch
  2. Chapter 2: 02-The River and Its Explorers (12:32) · watch
  3. Chapter 3: 03-Frescoes From the Past (31:54) · watch
  4. Chapter 4: 04-The Boys' Ambition (10:04) · watch
  5. Chapter 5: 05-I Want to be a Cub-pilot (9:21) · watch
  6. Chapter 6: 06-A Cub-pilot's Experience (15:12) · watch
  7. Chapter 7: 07-A Daring Deed (13:28) · watch
  8. Chapter 8: 08-Perplexing Lessons (13:19) · watch
  9. Chapter 9: 09-Continued Perplexities (13:52)
  10. Chapter 10: 10-Completing My Education (12:26)
  11. Chapter 11: 11-The River Rises (14:51)
  12. Chapter 12: 12-Sounding (13:11)
  13. Chapter 13: 13-A Pilot's Needs (17:54)
  14. Chapter 14: 14-Rank and Dignity of Piloting (14:19)
  15. Chapter 15: 15-The Pilots' Monopoly (24:39)
  16. Chapter 16: 16-Racing Days (11:59)
  17. Chapter 17: 17-Cut-offs and Stephen (16:31)
  18. Chapter 18: 18-I Take a Few Extra Lessons (11:56)
  19. Chapter 19: 19-Brown and I Exchange Compliments (8:00)
  20. Chapter 20: 20-A Catastophe (12:03)
  21. Chapter 21: 21-A Section in My Biography (1:43)
  22. Chapter 22: 22-I Return to My Muttons (17:46)
  23. Chapter 23: 23-Traveling Incognito (6:44)
  24. Chapter 24: 24-My Incognito is Exploded (11:55)
  25. Chapter 25: 25-From Cairo to Hickman (12:40)
  26. Chapter 26: 26-Under Fire (14:17)
  27. Chapter 27: 27-Some Imported Articles (11:45)
  28. Chapter 28: 28-Uncle Mumford Unloads (18:25)
  29. Chapter 29: 29-A Few Specimen Bricks (20:31)
  30. Chapter 30: 30-Sketches by the Way (17:42)
  31. Chapter 31: 31-A Thumb-print and What Came of It (32:17)
  32. Chapter 32: 32-The Disposal of a Bonanza (8:50)
  33. Chapter 33: 33-Refreshments and Ethics (10:29)
  34. Chapter 34: 34-Tough Yarns (4:16)
  35. Chapter 35: 35-Vicksburg During the Trouble (17:34)
  36. Chapter 36: 36-The Professor's Yarn (13:58)
  37. Chapter 37: 37-The End of the 'Gold Dust' (2:10)
  38. Chapter 38: 38-The House Beautiful (14:12)
  39. Chapter 39: 39-Manufactures and Miscreants (12:44)
  40. Chapter 40: 40-Castles and Culture (12:50)
  41. Chapter 41: 41-The Metropolis of the South (9:06)
  42. Chapter 42: 42-Hygiene and Sentiment (8:46)
  43. Chapter 43: 43-The Art of Inhumation (8:22)
  44. Chapter 44: 44-City Sights (15:02)
  45. Chapter 45: 45-Southern Sports (17:45)
  46. Chapter 46: 46-Enchantments and Enchanters (9:31)
  47. Chapter 47: 47-Uncle Remus and Mr. Cable (5:11)
  48. Chapter 48: 48-Sugar and Postage (14:17)
  49. Chapter 49: 49-Episodes in Pilot Life (12:11)
  50. Chapter 50: 50-The 'Original Jacobs' (11:45)
  51. Chapter 51: 51-Reminiscences (14:52)
  52. Chapter 52: 52-A Burning Brand (25:39)
  53. Chapter 53: 53-My Boyhood's Home (10:51)
  54. Chapter 54: 54-Past and Present (17:06)
  55. Chapter 55: 55-A Vendetta and Other Things (13:09)
  56. Chapter 56: 56-A Question of Law (11:11)
  57. Chapter 57: 57-An Archangel (13:35)
  58. Chapter 58: 58-On the Upper River (13:56)
  59. Chapter 59: 59-Legends and Scenery (15:34)
  60. Chapter 60: 60-Speculations and Conclusions (16:35)
  61. Chapter 61: Appendix A (23:35)
  62. Chapter 62: Appendix B (8:59)
  63. Chapter 63: Appendix C (9:01)
  64. Chapter 64: Appendix D (31:52)

Full text

This work is too long to show on one page. Read it on Project Gutenberg · download ebook.txt

Sources

Raw pipeline data (admin)