Food as a Means of Contrasting Cultures

         Mark Twain wrote that an American man forced to consume European cuisine would “gradually waste away and eventually die”.  Twain’s writings often reference food and cooking, and they speak with a reverence that at times seems to emulate religious terminology.  However, more than a gastronomic author causes these recurring descriptions; Twain utilizes food to compare cultures.  Twain critiques the foods and practices of Europe and the United States in “At the Appetite Cure” and the penultimate chapter of A Tramp Abroad, in a political manner to assess the cultures, creating works that champion America while criticizing European nations.  

            Twain uses words that describe the hearty taste of American food while praising its simplicity; this is precisely the same way that Twain views America.  Twain often praises American foods, such as when he speaks in A Tramp Abroad of a “mighty porterhouse steak and inch and a half thick, hot and sputtering from the griddle... enriched with butter of the most unimpeachable freshness and genuineness” as an American food whose goodness cannot be accurately described with words.  According to the Oxford Companion, the message that Twain was sending to the American people was that they should be proud of their tasty and abundant, yet simple food.  Twain creates characters in multiple stories that praise this homely food, ranging from characters in Huckleberry Finn to Roughing It to the narrator in A Tramp Abroad (Camfield).  These characters not only praise the food, they praise the culture that produces the food through their subtle commentary of the society. It is through the praise of characters and the personal writings of Twain himself that we are able to see just how much Twain respected and prized the straight-forwardness of the American diet and culture.

            Twain uses European food as a vehicle for accosting the continent’s culture and society.   While the narrator in A Tramp Abroad speaks mainly of food, Twain clearly intimates his views of more than the food.  Twain never overtly criticizes Europeans; rather he masks his criticism by describing the horrors of European food.  In A Tramp Abroad, the narrator is subjected to coffee that “resembles the real thing as hypocrisy resembles holiness”, bread that is “cold; cold and tough, and unsympathetic... always the same tiresome thing”, which is followed by “tasteless” butter that is “a sham” and made with “goodness knows what”.  While these menu items would make a terrible meal, the vocabulary Twain uses does not allow readers to focus only on the food.  Readers are confronted with words describing food such as “hypocrisy”, “unsympathetic”, and “sham”.  These words are not words that are commonly used in the evaluation and characterization of food, they are words that are normally used to describe, unfavorably so, people or cultures.  This attention to the detail of the vocabulary of the food descriptions further emphasizes that Twain did not hold European cuisine or culture in high esteem.

            It is not only the food of Europe that elicits such a negative response from Twain, their practices, designed to improve health, are also condemned.  The short story “At the Appetite Cure” was inspired by the real experiences of the Twain’s family: the Clemons.  As members of the family began to experience health problems such as seizures, depression, and general aches the Clemons family spent a great deal of time in Europe at the world-renowned baths and spas seeking cures.  Twain became disillusioned when no cures came, and no improvement was seen, and wrote the short story as a parody of the resorts (Camfield).  Twain realized that the resorts were not conducive for regaining good health, when he observed that many of the premises upon which the resorts based their cures were ones that a patient could perform without any medical supervision, such as skipping meals, or were based on inconsequential methods, such as bathing in a particular water (Camfield, Ober).  Twain saw these failings as his family’s health began to decline and he came to the conclusion that his earlier faith in the baths had been misplaced.  While Twain created a character in the story who is cured by one of these miracle spas, the tone of the story indicates a condescension toward Dr. Haimburger, the head doctor of the spa, as if to say that the services rendered by the doctor are superfluous.  This further criticism of European nations implies that Twain did not believe that they could be self-sufficient, rather they must rely on the services of other to survive.

The title of the short story is a double-entendre, which adds to the concept that Twain did not think highly of Europe: for tramp can be both a verb and a noun.  While the narrator is physically tramping through Europe, the title can also be taken as a further insult to Europeans.  The narrator often tries to adopt the views of the Europeans and in doing so, according to the Oxford Companion, becomes a tramp that is no longer loyal to his country and its values.  While that criticism is one that is leveled at a fictional American traveler, it is easily extended to all Americans who aspire to adopt some of the views and customs of Europe.  Labeling a man who tries to adopt European values as a tramp expresses the depth of contempt Twain felt for the Europeans; as if wanting to be more like them was an unforgivable sin.

Twain also criticizes the European method for providing food to visitors in A Tramp Abroad.  He laments that people traveling through Europe must stay in hotels, a “sorrowful business”.  He compares this method of providing for travelers’ needs with the American way, which consists of travelers dining with private families.  The narrator states that if the Europeans did this, Europe would have a “charm that it now lacks”.  Twain uses the fact that travelers are forced to eat in impersonal hotels instead of in a familial atmosphere to further criticize the European culture, insinuating that the Europeans are not hospitable or welcoming. 

In both the short story “At the Appetite Cure” and the chapter of A Tramp Abroad, Mark Twain’s opinions on the differences between American and Europeans cultures become clear.  It becomes obvious, through Twain’s analysis of food and practices, that he favors the simplicity and wholesomeness of American society to the overly sophisticated, yet unwelcoming aspects of the culture of Europe.

Ober, K Patrick.  Mark Twain and Medicine: “Any Mummery Will Cure”.  Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 2003. Print

Camfield, Gregg.  The Oxford Companion to Mark Twain.  Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003.  Print.

The Mark Twain House.  PBS- Mark Twain Classroom.  1907.  PBS.  Web.  12 October, 2011.


Twain, Mark.  A Tramp Abroad.  New York: Harper and Brothers, 1921.  Print


Twain, Mark.  "At the Appetite Cure."  Cosmopolitan.  Issue 25.  New York.  1898.