Christian Science

Twain, Mark. Christian Science. New York: Oxford University Press, (1907) 1996.

Novelist, satirist, and social critic Twain took note of the interest in Mary Baker Eddy and Christian Science, and he put together his own book, drawn primarily from articles he had written over the years for Cosmopolitan and other periodicals. Twain fully engaged his vivid imagination in creating this text, fueled by evidence (some true, some false) offered to him from hostile sources such as Frederick Peabody, who made a career out of defaming Eddy. The book was not very successful, but serves as a testimony to Eddy’s importance in American culture. It has raised ongoing questions for Twain scholars trying to understand his obsessive interest in Eddy, whom he alternately loathed and admired. For more on Twain’s complex relationship with Eddy, see chapter 1, “O God, is it all?” in Stephen Gottschalk’s book Rolling Away the Stone: Mary Baker Eddy’s Challenge to Materialism.

ISBN-10: 1443757780
ISBN-13 (Softcover): 978-1443757782

See also annotations:

Rolling Away the Stone: Mary Baker Eddy’s Challenge to Materialism by Stephen Gottschalk

Mary Baker Eddy by Gillian Gill

“Mark Twain and Mary Baker Eddy: Gendering the Transpersonal Subject” by Cynthia D. Schrager

“Authorship and Authority in Intellectual Property: The Copyright Activism of Mary Baker Eddy” by Andrew Ventimiglia

Awake to a Perfect Day: My Experience with Christian Science by Clara Clemens