Pudd’nhead WilsonPudd’nhead Wilson

By Mark Twain

Biography of Mark Twain

• Born Samuel Langhorne Clemens in 1835

• Raised in Hannibal, Missouri, a river town

• At age 12, went to work (as a printer, steamboat pilot, Confederate soldier (for only a few weeks), a prospector, miner, and a reporter.

X

What’s the big deal about Twain?

TIME magazine

July 14, 2008

• Getting Past Black and White - TIME

Biography, cont.• Known as a humorist

because of his early works. However, after Life on the Mississippi and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, he became known as one of the greatest writers in America.

•Pudd’nhead Wilson is a novel that reflects Twain’s feelings about racism and the human spirit. It also expresses his belief that environment shapes the human character.

Twain’s life was riddled with tragedy. He experienced the deaths of his daughters (ages 24 and 29), and was financially bankrupt most of his life. His wife died in 1904, and he died in 1910 at age 74.

•Pudd’nhead Wilson is not meant to be humorous as were the previously mentioned works.

What do YOU think?• Is a person’s

character formed before he or she is born, or does the environment shape a person’s character?

• What kinds of traits do we inherit from our parents?

• How does history, society, and culture affect who we become?

Who would you be today if you were born into one of these families?

Nature The Connection vs. Nurture to the novel

• A slave named Roxy switches her own baby with her master’s so that her son will be free. Ironically, her son becomes a selfish, weak, and horrible man.

• Readers are made aware that Twain’s point is that environment shapes human beings. Roxy’s son would have been a humble, loving, and diligent man had he been raised as HER son.

Prepare yourself!

• Twain’s vocabulary is sophisticated in this novel! (Notice I used the word is —why? )

• You will be required to keep a vocabulary journal while reading. When I ask for it, be ready!

• For some, Roxy’s dialect is difficult to understand. Read slowly and aloud if it helps!

A special note from me: I cannot bear to hear my students say (or whine!), “This book is too hard to read. Your quizzes are too hard.” The last statement is usually true because STUDENTS DON’T TRY TO READ!

• “That he makes them neither heroes nor villains is a tribute to his understanding of the human character. Color is only skin deep. In this novel Twain shows more than anything else environment shapes the man.”

Langston Hughes, one of the greatest African-American writers in history (1902-1967), wrote that:

“Mark Twain, in his presentation of Negroes as human beings [in Pudd’nhead Wilson], stands heads and shoulders above the other Southern writers of his times. It was a period when most writers who included Negro characters in their work at all, were given to presenting the slave as ignorant and happy, the freed men of

Twain’s Effect on Racism in American Literature

color as ignorant and miserable, and all Negroes as either comic servants on the one hand or dangerous brutes on the other.”

Characters in Pudd’nhead Wilson

Roxy: a slave woman who belongs to the Driscolls. She switches her baby with the Driscoll’s son.

Pudd’nhead Wilson: an attorney who enjoys the science of “palmistry” and fingerprints.

Tom: the boy who is known as Tom Driscoll (a.k.a. Chambers)

Chambers: the boy who is known as Roxy’s biological son.

Judge Driscoll: Tom’s uncle, a prosperous man in town

Counts Luigi and Angelo Capello: two Italian men who come to Dawson’s Landing to live.

LEAVE SPACE UNDER EACH CHARACTER FOR ADDITIONAL INFORMATION (TRAITS, ETC.)

Literary Model Elements

• Exposition: two babies were born in the same house on the same day—one to a slave and the other to the master’s wife. A week later, the white mother died.

• Setting: Dawson’s Landing, MO; 1830

• Hint at conflict: Roxy switches the babies.

IRONY: An abundant element in Pudd’nhead Wilson

• Irony: a method of expression in which the ordinary meaning of the words is the opposite of the thought in the speaker’s mind. Irony is an event contrary to what would naturally be expected.

• There is always irony when a society is unbalanced or unfair because events result in unfairness toward some person. When that happens, there is a reckoning or retribution for an unfair act.

• Irony is used to expose flaws in society and the human character in either a biting (harsh and/or obvious) or discreet way.

Your Assignment: A WEBQUEST

• Here’s the 411: You and a partner will serve as either prosecutors or defense attorneys for an accused criminal who faces robbery charges. Your client (or “criminal” you’re attempting to convict) claims he committed the crime because of his environment. (He has a twin brother who grew up in a different home! This twin seems to be a successful, contributing member to society.)

• Your research: Use the web to answer the following questions. Also check out the following link for an interesting news story (“Reunited twins embrace entwined future”).

Webquest Questions:

• Read the news story at:• http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/33433763.stm

• 1) Why are twins used to study the issue of NATURE VS. NURTURE?

• 2) How could heredity effect one’s tastes, decisions, and characteristics?

• 3) What types of environmental factors could play upon people’s tastes, decisions, and characteristics?