The Prince and the Pauper

Mark Twain's first attempt at historical fiction, “The Prince and the Pauper”, was first published in 1881. It is a story set in the time of Prince Edward, of house Tudor, who at age nine would become King Edward VI. When young Prince Edward meets a Pauper, Tom Canty, who likes a lot like him, he convinces the two to switch clothes so that they can be mistaken for each other and end up switching places. While they play out their new roles, Prince Edward learns of the struggles of the commoners of England while Tom discovers what it is like to be a Prince and then a King. Twain wrote with regards to his novel that, “My idea is to afford a realizing sense of the exceeding severity of the laws of that day by inflicting some of their penalties upon the King himself and allowing him a chance to see the rest of them applied to others. . .” A delightfully comedic tale, “The Prince and the Pauper” is at its heart a social commentary on judging others simply by their appearance. This edition includes the illustrations of Franklin Booth and a biographical afterword.