Other editions of book The Prince and the Pauper

Mark Twain's first foray into historical fantasy is a witty and satirical tale of switched identities. Tom is a beggar in 16th-century England. A chance meeting with Edward, the crown prince, results in an instant friendship and a wild scheme. The two boys, almost identical in appearance, decide to take each other's place in society. The escapade that follows opens the eyes of both the prince and the pauper. But when the situation threatens to spiral out of control, will they be able to get back to the lives they knew? A thrilling adventure peppered with sharp criticism of class inequalities, The Prince and the Pauper has inspired countless imitators but remains an unmissable original.

Classics Illustrated was a series of LITERATURE CLASSICS put into form of a comic book, in order to introduce children to the classics in a fun form of reading. They are highly collectible. Amazon offers a book that tells of all the comics in this series that were offered. This particular comic introduces THE PRINCE AND THE PAUPER to you in a vivid, colorful and fun-for-adults-even reading.

The Prince and the Pauper: This treasured historical satire, played out in two very different socioeconomic worlds of 16th-century England, centers around the lives of two boys born in London on the same day: Edward, Prince of Wales and Tom Canty, a street beggar. During a chance encounter, the two realize they are identical and, as a lark, decide to exchange clothes and roles--a situation that briefly, but drastically, alters the lives of both youngsters. The Prince, dressed in rags, wanders about the city's boisterous neighborhoods among the lower classes and endures a series of hardships; meanwhile, poor Tom, now living with the royals, is constantly filled with the dread of being discovered for who and what he really is. A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court In the book, a Yankee engineer from Connecticut is accidentally transported back in time to the court of King Arthur, where he fools the inhabitants of that time into thinking that he is a magician, and soon uses his knowledge of modern technology to become a "magician" in earnest, stunning the English of the Early Middle Ages with such feats as demolitions, fireworks, and the shoring up of a holy well. He attempts to modernize the past, but in the end he is unable to prevent the death of Arthur and an interdict against him by the Catholic Church of the time, which grows fearful of his power. Twain wrote the book as a burlesque of Romantic notions of chivalry after being inspired by a dream in which he was a knight himself, severely inconvenienced by the weight and cumbersome nature of his armor.