SOURCE: "Mark Twain's 'Jumping Frog': Toward an American Heroic Ideal," in Mark Twain Journal, Vol. XIX, No. 2, pp. 15-18.

In the following essay, Smith contends that Twain's purpose in the story is "To define and explore what is true and valuable about Simon Wheeler" and the particularly American qualities he represents.

Mark Twain's "Jumping Frog"¹ has been at the center of a critical controversy in recent years. This controversy focuses on one major question. Is the story satiric, with Simon Wheeler as a deadpan trickster making fun of the narrator, or is it simply a wild yarn told by a mindless yokel? Interpretations and claims for the story have varied widely. Some have argued that the "Jumping Frog" is the summation of Twain's faith in frontier democracy,² while others have held that it is no more than an amusing story, told in an "exquisitely absurd" manner.³ A close...