John Hay, famous as Lincoln’s private secretary and later as secretary of state under presidents McKinley and Roosevelt, and Samuel Langhorne Clemens, famous for being “Mark Twain,” grew up 50 miles apart in the same rural antebellum stew of race and class and want. This shared history helped draw them together when they first met as up-and-coming young men in the late 1860s, and their mutual admiration never waned in spite of sharp differences in personality, worldview and public conduct. In THE STATESMAN AND THE STORYTELLER, the last decade of their lives plays out against the tumultuous events of the day.