The Tragedy of Pudd’nhead Wilson

In a sleepy Mississippi town, two babies—one born to slavery, one to privilege—are secretly switched in the cradle, and the consequences ripple through the decades toward a murder solved by the eccentric lawyer Pudd’nhead Wilson using the new science of fingerprints. Twain turns a tragic, ingenious plot into a searing indictment of slavery and the fictions of race, laced with his trademark humor and the sardonic ‘Pudd’nhead Wilson’s Calendar.’ Dark, sharp, and ahead of its time, the novel exposes the arbitrariness of the color line with devastating irony. Both a pioneering detective story and a bitter social satire, Pudd’nhead Wilson is one of Twain’s most provocative works.