PUDD'NHEAD WILSON - Mark Twain (New Edition 2018)

Born November 30, 1835 in Florida, Mark Twain “came in with the comet” and as he predicted he went “out with the comet” passing away on April 21, 1910, the day after Halley’s Comet returned. His real name was Samuel Longhorne Clemens, and he took his pen name from his days as a riverboat pilot on the Mississippi River where the cry “mark twain” signaled the depth of water -- about 12 feet was required for the safe passage of riverboats. Mark Twain was a talented writer, speaker and humorist whose own personality shined through his work. As his writing grew in popularity, he became a public figure and iconic American. As the young country grew in size but not in a cultural manner to the liking of the European gentry, it became fashionable to criticize "the ugly American.” 

Pudd’nhead Wilson is setted in the fictional Missouri frontier town of Dawson’s Landing on the banks of the Mississippi River, in the first half of the 19th century. David Wilson, a young lawyer, moves to town and a clever remark of his is misunderstood, which causes locals to brand him a ”pudd’nhead” – a nitwit. His hobby of collecting fingerprints does not raise his standing in the townsfolk’s eyes, who see him as an eccentric and do not frequent his law practice. Puddn’head Wilson moves into the background as the focus shifts to the slave Roxy, her son, and the family they serve. Roxy is only one-sixteenth black, and her son Valet de Chambre (referred to as ”Chambers”) is only 1/32 black. Roxy is principally charged with caring for her inattentive master’s infant son Tom Driscoll, who is the same age as her own son... 

“Adam was but human—this explains it all. He did not want the apple for the apple's sake, he wanted it only because it was forbidden. The mistake was in not forbidding the serpent; then he would have eaten the serpent.”