Benjamin Franklin is one man that continues to be looked up to throughout history. Virtually self-taught, he excelled as an athlete, a man of letters, a printer, a scientist, a wit, an inventor, an editor, and a writer, and he was probably the most successful diplomat in American history. David Hume hailed him as the first great philosopher and great man of letters in the New World.

Franklin's autobiography was initially written to guide his son through the lively tales and spellbinding account of his unique and eventful life.

"How to Tell a Story and Other Essays" is a classic collection of essays first published in 1897 under the direction of Mark Twain, America’s most famous satirist. It is but one volume in the phenomenal 29-volume Oxford Mark Twain.

"Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offences," the best-known and best-loved essay in this collection, is Mark Twain’s how-to guide for the would-be author. A hilarious and cutting critique of what not to do, this deliciously wicked essay also reveals what writers should and must do if they want their fiction to come alive--as Twain's own fiction always does.