The Center for Mark Twain Studies (CMTS) at Elmira College kicked off the 2026 Fall Trouble Begins Lecture Series last night. The lectures take place on Wednesdays throughout October at Quarry Farm. Located at 131 Crane Road (Elmira), the lectures are free and open to the public. The next lecture in the 2026 Fall series will take place on Wendesday, October 28.
Ambassador Donald T. Bliss (retired) presented “Mark Twain’s Election Advice: Vote Your Conscience!” Bliss is a Mark Twain Studies Independent Scholar is a retried ambassodor, serving in the federal goverment for more that thirteen years, practicing law in Washington D.C. for more than thirty years. He is the author of six books, including Mark Twain’s Tale of Today and Mark Twain’s Ten Lessons for a Healthy Democracy. His great-grandfather and grandfather were Mark Twain’s publishers
A Gilded Age political commentator, Mark Twain believed that democracy requires informed and engaged citizens who vote their conscience for candidates of integrity and accomplishment, regardless of party or platform. Twain wrote his beloved Livy: “when we are not satisfied, we can change things.” Mark Twain can’t tell you how to vote, but his guidelines remain relevant today.
The 2026 Fall Trouble Begins Lecture Series Schedule. All lectures start at 7:00 p.m., at the Barn at Quarry Farm, and are free and open to the public.
- Wednesday, Oct. 28: “The Mundane Transcendence of Mark Twain’s Late Style” by Ray Horton, Murray State University
About The Trouble Begins Lecture Series
In 1984, the Elmira College Center for Mark Twain Studies initiated a lecture series, The Trouble Begins at Eight lecture series. The title came from the handbill advertising Mark Twain’s October 2, 1866 lecture presented at Maguire’s Academy of Music in San Francisco. The first lectures were presented in 1985. By invitation, Mark Twain scholars present lectures in the fall and spring of each year, in the Barn at Quarry Farm or at Peterson Chapel in Cowles Hall on Elmira College’s campus. All lectures are free and open to the public.