Rating: 
Summary: A Mark Twain Classic
Review: "Pudd'nhead Wilson" is a typical Mark Twain novel. Set in early 19th century Dawson's Landing, Missouri, it has everything we expect from Mark Twain. The exploits of the title character, Pudd'nhead Wilson, calendar maker par excellence and sometime lawyer, are skillfully intertwined with other characters, some of whom seem to take the story over for a time before Pudd'nhead takes it back again, such as Roxy, the slave and Tom Driscoll, heir of the town aristocracy and...well, read the book.Told in Twain's humorous style, the reader is introduced to the absurdity of class and racial distinctions in the pre-Civil War South, a court room scene reminiscent of Tom Sawyer and the quick draw stereotyping of small town America, all leavened with America's innate goodness and justice. In this book we read an original usage of the term "Sold down the river." This book moves quickly and holds your attention so that you will never want to put it down. Although not one of Twain's most popular works, it would be great by almost anyone else's standards. Enjoy this piece of Americana, as have generations before.
Rating:
Summary: A Mark Twain Classic
Review: "Pudd'nhead Wilson" is a typical Mark Twain novel. Set in early 19th century Dawson's Landing, Missouri, it has everything we expect from Mark Twain. The exploits of the title character, Pudd'nhead Wilson, calendar maker par excellence and sometime lawyer, are skillfully intertwined with other characters, some of whom seem to take the story over for a time before Pudd'nhead takes it back again, such as Roxy, the slave and Tom Driscoll, heir of the town aristocracy and...well, read the book. Told in Twain's humorous style, the reader is introduced to the absurdity of class and racial distinctions in the pre-Civil War South, a court room scene reminiscent of Tom Sawyer and the quick draw stereotyping of small town America, all leavened with America's innate goodness and justice. In this book we read an original usage of the term "Sold down the river." This book moves quickly and holds your attention so that you will never want to put it down. Although not one of Twain's most popular works, it would be great by almost anyone else's standards. Enjoy this piece of Americana, as have generations before.
Rating: 
Summary: Pudd'nhead Wilson
Review: Another one of Mark Twains mystery's. It starts out with a young slave woman,fearing for her young sons's life,exchanges the light-skinned child with her master's. So from this position,Mark Twain starts out with one of his most weirdest mystery novels ever. So from this a detective sets out on a mystery of reversed identities,a horrible crime and to go with that nobody believes the detective,so it goes into the courtroom.
Rating: 
Summary: Deceiving Appearances and Labels Have Profound Consequences!
Review: Do others ever misjudge you? Did you, as a result, ever have a nickname you didn't like? Did you appreciate that experience? How did you overcome it? What if you had been switched in the baby nursery at the hospital for another child? How might your life have been different? These are the kinds of thoughts that will occur to you as you read Pudd'nhead Wilson. I was attracted to the story after reading about its genesis in the new illustrated biography of Mark Twain. Pudd'nhead Wilson is tragic story about the consequences of two children being switched at birth in the slave-holding society of the American South. Those who admire the eloquent portrayal of common humanity among African-Americans and whites in Huckleberry Finn will find more examples of this point to delight them in Pudd'nhead Wilson. Pudd'nhead Wilson was a novel that gave Mark Twain a great many problems. The book started as a short story about Italian Siamese twins with a farcical character, as the drunken twin caused the Prohibitionist one to get into trouble with his woolly headed sweetheart. As Twain turned the story into a novel, the most important characters began to disappear in favor of new characters. Stymied, Twain realized that he had written two stories in one novel. He then excised the original of the two stories in favor of the tragedy, while leaving many satirical and ironic characteristics. Part of this switch no doubt related to Twain's growing pessimism as he grew older and to the personal tragedies and financial difficulties dogged his efforts and life. Perhaps it is this deep plot difficulty that caused Twain to leave the novel with two rather large flaws, which vastly reduce its effectiveness. The first flaw is building a plot around switching two children at birth to establish that perceived racial differences and slavery had been unjust. Unfortunately, the "bad" actor in the novel turns out to be the irresponsible Tom Driscoll (ne Valet de Chambre), who is 1/32 African-American but is raised as a white free man. Thus, those readers who wish to believe in racial differences affecting character can point to that underlying racial factor as still being present in explaining the misbehavior in the story . . . despite what appears to have been Twain's opposite intention. Had Twain developed his story to make the false Tom morally equal to his all-white counterpart Chambers (ne Thomas a Beckett Driscoll), the story would have worked much better in condemning racism and slavery. The second flaw involves having the story turn on establishing the unchanging nature of finger prints in a trial conducted in a small Missouri town many decades before that point was scientifically proven and legally accepted. For us today, the story moves slowly because we know all about fingerprints as a means of identification which makes much of the eventual resolution easy to anticipate, and also because Twain left many unnecessary remnants of his other story in the book. Despite these weaknesses, the Pudd'nhead Wilson has many brilliant sections that strikingly portray how the concepts and realities of slavery corrupted both African-Americans and slave-holders. Because of thefts in the Driscoll household, the real Tom's father threatens to sell his slaves down the river (a fate to be avoided). When three of them confess, he agrees to sell them locally. Frightened by the potential for her child to be sold in the future, Roxy plans to kill herself and her son. By accident, she realizes that she can successfully switch the two children's clothing, since both of them look the same to Tom's father, and ensure that her son will never be sold, because he will be raised as the master's son, a white person. Many of the ways for rearing white child are bad for Tom, making him spoiled and disagreeable. Chambers does much better on a simple diet, and from performing physical labor. Tom is arrogant and nasty. Chambers is uneducated and cowed. Later, when Tom realizes that he is 1/32 African-American, he begins to behave as a slave would towards white people. But the story is much broader than that. Pudd'nhead (a derogatory term somewhat like "featherhead") Wilson is thought to be a fool by the townspeople because of something he said about a dog when he first came to town. Because of that perception, his legal career is delayed by 20 years . . . even though he is actually quite bright. In other areas of the story, a man dresses as women and a woman dresses as a man. A thief has his booty stolen from him, so he is also the victim. In many ways, the story reminds me of Shakespeare's many comedies and tragedies about misperceptions being harmful to all concerned. Although you will not think this is one of Mark Twain's best books, it is one that will encourage you to have many valuable thoughts about questioning labels and assumptions that we apply to one another. For example, if someone is not very quick to grasp certain widely-accepted points, we may feel the person is stupid. The person may actually be able to grasp many nuances that make the situation ambiguous, and be the opposite of stupid. Or someone who is slow in one way may be a positive genius in other ways. Yet a label may be attached that is the opposite. Keep an open mind, and observe vastly more about what is going on . . . and be able to create vastly better results!
Rating:
Summary: The real deal on Pudd N' Head Wilson
Review: I enjoyed reading Pudd N' Head Wilson. It was a little slow at times, but it made up for it, with all the mystery going on, within the novel. If you like educating yourself about slavery, and don't mind seeing the"real", I felt for the slave mother Roxy in the novel, I'm sad that she had to make that type of life changing decison for her, and her son. As well as Tom, and if it had been me,then I can't say I wouldn't have done the same thing. I look foward to reading other books, but the infamous Mark Twain.
Rating:
Summary: The book was very confusing, but well-written.
Review: Pudd n'Head Wilson was a well written book, and I enjoyed it somewhat. I like the plot of the book. It came of big interest to me. It was like no other book I have read. Although, it was well-written, it was very complicated and confusing because of the language Mark Twain used. It was not his fault because that is how people used to talk. I would not recommend this book to a young one, or someone who is not advanced in their reading class. This book is not as popular as I thought it would be. It was not one of my favorite books, but I will recommend this book to young adults and adults who like to know about the past, but also like a little laugh in between the plot.
Rating:
Summary: What makes an individual who he is?
Review: Pudd'nhead Wilson by Mark Twain is a quick read, yet profound. This switched-at-brith tragic tale is wonderfully told with Twain's wit and humor, and well done vernacular of the slave-speech.
There are two audiances one should consider while reading this book. The audience of the time in which the book was written, and today's modern audience, as the standards for the two, and the message conveyed are diferent for each of these. Roxy, a slave women who is one sixteenth black descent gives birth to a child who is one thirty-second part black descent. Her masters also have a child born on the same day to her, and Roxy is caretaker to both. A day comes when Roxy is so overcome with grief of the possible future that her son may be "sold down the river"(a tragedy to a slave, as they don't treat thier slaves as well down-river, or so is the common belief) that she is nearly moved to kill herself and her son to save him from this dreadfull future. However, she happens upon an idea of switching her child for the child of her master, as they look very much alike, neither herself or her child appear black in the least. The switch is successfull for many years. The two boys grow up together, one as the master who would have been slave, and the other as the slave, who would have been master had they not had thier places switched. The one who has taken the place of Tom grows up spoiled, becomes a gambler and loafer and mistreats the one who is his caretaker, and in actuality his mother. Pudd'nhead Wilson, nicknamed so as he is seen as the town dunderhead for his eccentric habits will become the 'hero' of this story. He has a hobby of collecting and comparing fingerprints, and the town's citizens indulge him in this by allowing thier fingerprints to be taken at verious intervals in thier lives, as well as that of thier babes. This will prove the undoing of the would-be white heir. In a final climatic court scene of a murder trial, Pudd'nhead Wilson uncovers the fact of the two who are switched at birth, and the guilt of murder by the one who is Tom, but is not Tom. The places of these individuals are set right, the one who has lived as a slave all his life is given his inheritance and set free, and the one who has been the imposter is, in the end, sold down the river. Now one must wonder what this book would have meant to readers in the day it was first written? Would it be likely that they would see that justice had been served? The truly white heir restored to his place, and the one who should have been a slave returned to his place under the lash in hard labor? Would they have wondered that there could be so little difference between the ones who should have such different roles in life that everyone could be fooled by thier being switched? As I read it, I wondered, as I have many times when reading works by Twain, how there could have been such an injustice as slavery in existance. I also wondered at the fact that someone who was in all appearences white could still be a slave. You would think that at the very least, slave holders would have been able to sympathise with the apparently white slave, and think upon this. Perhaps this was one step on the road to the ebolishment of slavery? I would have liked to read more of the lives of these two, now returned to the roles to which they were born, but the story ends too soon. Still, a very good story and one which should be read.
Rating:
Summary: What makes an individual who he is?
Review: Pudd'nhead Wilson by Mark Twain is a quick read, yet profound. This switched-at-brith tragic tale is wonderfully told with Twain's wit and humor, and well done vernacular of the slave-speech. There are two audiances one should consider while reading this book. The audience of the time in which the book was written, and today's modern audience, as the standards for the two, and the message conveyed are diferent for each of these. Roxy, a slave women who is one sixteenth black descent gives birth to a child who is one thirty-second part black descent. Her masters also have a child born on the same day to her, and Roxy is caretaker to both. A day comes when Roxy is so overcome with grief of the possible future that her son may be "sold down the river"(a tragedy to a slave, as they don't treat thier slaves as well down-river, or so is the common belief) that she is nearly moved to kill herself and her son to save him from this dreadfull future. However, she happens upon an idea of switching her child for the child of her master, as they look very much alike, neither herself or her child appear black in the least. The switch is successfull for many years. The two boys grow up together, one as the master who would have been slave, and the other as the slave, who would have been master had they not had thier places switched. The one who has taken the place of Tom grows up spoiled, becomes a gambler and loafer and mistreats the one who is his caretaker, and in actuality his mother. Pudd'nhead Wilson, nicknamed so as he is seen as the town dunderhead for his eccentric habits will become the 'hero' of this story. He has a hobby of collecting and comparing fingerprints, and the town's citizens indulge him in this by allowing thier fingerprints to be taken at verious intervals in thier lives, as well as that of thier babes. This will prove the undoing of the would-be white heir. In a final climatic court scene of a murder trial, Pudd'nhead Wilson uncovers the fact of the two who are switched at birth, and the guilt of murder by the one who is Tom, but is not Tom. The places of these individuals are set right, the one who has lived as a slave all his life is given his inheritance and set free, and the one who has been the imposter is, in the end, sold down the river. Now one must wonder what this book would have meant to readers in the day it was first written? Would it be likely that they would see that justice had been served? The truly white heir restored to his place, and the one who should have been a slave returned to his place under the lash in hard labor? Would they have wondered that there could be so little difference between the ones who should have such different roles in life that everyone could be fooled by thier being switched? As I read it, I wondered, as I have many times when reading works by Twain, how there could have been such an injustice as slavery in existance. I also wondered at the fact that someone who was in all appearences white could still be a slave. You would think that at the very least, slave holders would have been able to sympathise with the apparently white slave, and think upon this. Perhaps this was one step on the road to the ebolishment of slavery? I would have liked to read more of the lives of these two, now returned to the roles to which they were born, but the story ends too soon. Still, a very good story and one which should be read.
Rating:
Summary: Don't Risk Things So Serious
Review: Pudd'nhead Wilson is a book about a slave named Roxy who does'nt want her baby Chambers to be sent down to the river. So she switches her baby with her masters baby Tom. Since Chambers was so light skined her master couldn't tell the difference. As the two boys grew up together Chambers was the one who protected Tom and was hard working. Tom however, was very rude an selfish. Then finally when the boys were adults everything was fixed. The real Tom got his money and the real Chambers was a slave...
I happen to like this book a little because it's interesting to know what happens to two people who have switchd lives for so long. One who has lots of money and the right to do anything when he really is a slave. The other who works twenty-four hours a day with labor in the sun with no rights, when he should have lots of money and live in a nice house. You see things like this don't happen in real life everyday.
Rating:
Summary: Great Story for all ages
Review: Pudd'nhead Wilson is a great story that can be read by those of all ages. For a book that was written over a hundred years ago, it is amazing to see all of the aspects that make todays books and movies so great; a murder, a great court scene, thrilling dectective work, a switched birth, and overall an ironic and surprising ending. Its not a long book and it can be read in one or two sittings. The social overtones in this book also really make you think about race relations today. Twain is a fablous author and although this book is not as great as Huck Finn, if you loved that as I did, you will certainly enjoy Puddn'head Wilson
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