Mark Twain, pseudonym of Samuel Langhorne Clemens, was born in Florida, Missouri on 30 November 1835. He was the sixth child in the family of Jane Lampton and John Marshall Clemens. In 1839 the Twain family moved to the city of Hannibal, Missouri, a port on the Mississippi River. There he received a public school education. When his father died in 1847 the family was left in financial straits. Eleven year old Samuel left school and obtained his first of many jobs working with various newspapers and magazines. Subsequently he worked as a printer in many other cities. Later Clemens was a steamboat pilot on the Mississippi River. In 1861 the writer served briefly as a volunteer soldier in the Confederate cavalry. Later that year he accompanied his brother and tried his hand at silver mining. In 1862 he became a reporter and in 1863 he began signing his articles with the pseudonym Mark Twain. His famous penname Twain adopted from the call ('Mark twain!' – meaning by the mark of two fathoms) used when sounding river shallows. But this isn't the full story: he had also satirized an older writer, Isaiah Sellers, who called himself Mark Twain. In 1870 Twain married Olivia Langdon with whom he had four children. 
Three died before they reached their twenties. His wife died in 1904. Only daughter Clara by name (1870-1962) lived to the age of 88. Mark Twain wrote a lot of books. One of his major achievements is the way he narrated “ Huckleberry Finn”, following the twists and turns of ordinary speech, his native Missouri dialect. During his long writing career, Twain produced a considerable number of essays. He travelled much and wrote humorous travel accounts. In Twain's later years he wrote less, but he became a celebrity, frequently speaking out on public issues. Twain received an honorary doctorate from the University of Oxford in 1907. Mark Twain died on 21 April 1910 in Connecticut and now rests in the Woodlawn Cemetery in Livy’s hometown of Elmira, New York State, buried beside her and the children.
Twain Mark, is known all over the world as an American writer and humorist, whose best work is characterized by broad, often irreverent humor or biting social satire. Twain's writing is also noted for realism of place and language, memorable characters, and hatred of hypocrisy and oppression.
Read more about Mark Twain: http://www.online-literature.com/twain/
By the way, a lot of Mark Twain's short stories are included into education programm of popular students' books in Russia. I even remember one story, which was about different ways of journalizm. Mark Twain has his original style of writing, where deep meaning goes together with ironical plot.
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