The Prince and the Pauper

Outline

The Prince and the Pauper (1881) tells the story of Edward Tudor, the young Prince of Wales, and Tom Canty, a poor boy from London who looks remarkably like him. After exchanging clothes, the two boys are mistaken for one another and forced to experience lives completely different from their own. Through their adventures, Mark Twain explores social inequality, injustice, identity, and the consequences of judging people by their appearance or position in society.

• Edward Tudor, the Prince of Wales, and Tom Canty, a poor London boy, look remarkably alike and swap clothes.
• Once the clothes are exchanged, people mistake each boy for the other, and each must live a life very unlike his own.
• Living in each other's place shows the boys social inequality and injustice they had never seen from where they stood.
• Twain questions what defines a person, suggesting that status and appearance say little about who someone really is.
• The novel warns against judging people by their appearance or their position in society.

Mark Twain was an American writer, humorist, lecturer, and social critic whose real name was Samuel Langhorne Clemens. He became one of the most celebrated figures in American literature through novels, travel writing, essays, and public lectures. Known for his wit, memorable characters, and sharp criticism of hypocrisy and injustice, he used humour and storytelling to examine American society and human nature.