Prince and the Pauper

The Prince and the Pauper is a classic adventure of mistaken identity set in Tudor London and told with Mark Twain’s trademark humour and concern for social justice.Part of the Macmillan Collector’s Library; a series of stunning, clothbound, pocket sized classics with gold foiled edges and ribbon markers. These beautiful books make perfect gifts or a treat for any book lover. This edition has an afterword by author and journalist Nicolette Jones.Penniless Tom Canty wonders what it would be like to be a prince. Heir to the throne Edward Tudor dreams of a life outside the royal palace walls. When the two boys meet by chance they’re amazed by how similar they look and agree to swap clothes. Dressed in rags, Edward is thrown out onto the streets whilst courtiers have no idea that their prince is a pauper. Will each boy be able to find his way home?

Twain's great virtue as a writer, his genius, was his deliberate refusal of borrowed propriety or scale. The tallest of tales could be fashioned from the most modest of ingredients, Twain was ahead of his time. He was one of America’s first modern celebrities, an icon of the first age of mass media, Twain was surely the American Dickens, however much he would have hated the phrase—and however high a tribute it seems today

Samuel Langhorne Clemens was born in Missouri in 1835. Early in his childhood, the family moved to Hannibal, Missouri – a town which would provide the inspiration for St Petersburg in Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. When he started writing in earnest in his thirties, he adopted the pseudonym Mark Twain (the cry of a Mississippi boatman taking depth measurements, meaning ‘two fathoms’), and a string of highly successful publications followed. His later life, however, was marked by personal tragedy and sadness, as well as financial difficulty. In 1894, several businesses in which he had invested failed, and he was declared bankrupt. Over the next fifteen years he saw the deaths of two of his beloved daughters, and his wife. Increasingly bitter and depressed, Twain died in 1910, aged seventy-four.