I read Mark Twain's The Prince and the Pauper on the red eye flight home last night.
You know the story - it's been told over and over again. Poor boy changes places with prince. Both rise to the occasion, etc.
Yet the poor boy, Tom, is totally without guile. So it takes him a bit longer to understand what is happening. And the prince, Edward, is totally without perspective. So the shock of life outside the palace is at first entertaining, then frightening, then intolerable, then enlightening. Both of them manage to suffer through, despite their longings for past familiarities.
I love the part where Tom finds a book about life at court and reads it eagerly, in an attempt to figure out what is expected of him. And where he must endure a 20 minute delay in his dressing routine because there was a snag in one of the stockings they attempted to dress him with. Also love his reaction when a woman who is accused of being a witch (She is supposedly the creator of storms) is brought before him. He had called her away from the executioner. He asked her eagerly if she might make a storm? And she tries her best, to please the king who would free her, but to no success. He says sadly, "Your powers are gone, but if you should find them returned, please come to me quickly for I shall very much like to have you make me a storm."
Edward to his credit, stays noble. Even when forced to be among the gang of thieves, he ruins all their plots by warning those about to be robbed and refusing to carry out his duties. One night he finds shelter in a barn and curls up next to a calf. He is warm and comforted in ways that he has not been by humans in a week, and falls asleep almost happy. In the morning, a rat, who has made a nest in his blanket, runs off and he laughs, "Well, if a king is lying with a rat then he must be at the bottom of his luck, so mine is surely about to be improved." That's the spirit, eh?!
In the end, Edward needs Tom to help prove that he's actually the king and Tom needs Edward to take over just in time for the coronation (Edward's father, the brutal and unloved Henry VIII, having died while the switch was on). So they have a chance to be true to each other, and thus life long friends. Good job!
I aspire to be as wholesome, constant and noble as those two boys. As always with Twain, it is a lovely story with thoughtful characters. He was such a great satirist, but I suspect too subtle. The idea of a poor child acting in much the same manner as a good prince... that must have seemed too strange in an age when education and opportunity were only for the rich. Although, that was his point, of course.
Too bad that Twain did not make his social point at the time, but good for us that this tale has lasted because of the quality of its story and depth of understanding of human nature.
I recommend The Prince and the Pauper for all, rich and poor, of any age!
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