As I read Pudd’nhead Wilson, I was drawn to Twain’s use of fingerprint technology, which was extremely new at the time. However, it wasn’t the technology itself that peaked my interest but rather how he tied it in to his main theme. It doesn’t take a literary expert to determine that Twain is making some sort of statement about the concept of nature vs nurture as it relates to the character of both Tom and Chambers. I interpret Twain as advocating more for the nurture aspect as it becomes clear that “Tom” (originally Chambers) has been corrupted by his upbringing.
While the novel was written at the tail end of the 19th century, in 1894, the time period it is set in is the early 1800s. It goes without saying that racism remained ingrained in American culture throughout the century, making the message Twain presents even more poignant. By centering the novel on Tom and Chambers, who are switched as infants by Chambers’ mother Roxy, he is able to distinguish these characters not by the race they were assigned at birth but rather how they were raised.
While obvious today that one’s race does not impact one’s character, this lesson was important at the time of publication. Slavery may have been illegal by that time but racism was still rampant as Jim Crow laws and segregation had a horrendous impact on the next sixty years for black Americans. Clearly, Twain was ahead of his time.
Twain conveys this message through irony- most prominently in the way that “Tom” looks down upon his biological mother. He mentions Tom’s viewpoints on blacks frequently, quite obviously foreshadowing the conclusion of Tom’s true identity being revealed. “Tom had long ago taught Roxy ‘her place.’ It had been many a day now since she had ventured a caress or a fondling epithet in his quarter. Such things, from a ‘n*****,’ were repulsive to him, and she had been warned to keep her distance and remember who she was.” The last phrase of this quote encapsulates the irony as Tom expects Roxy to remember who she was without ever knowing who he himself is. Roxy’s switch of the babies clouded Tom’s identity as he grew up without the perspective of what it’s like to be on the other side of discrimination. In a way it once again alludes to the concept of nurture being the dominant factor in one’s identity. Tom displays cruelty to his own mother, even after knowing their true relationship, by selling her down the river. Even before that, he treated his own mother merely as property. “[Roxy] was merely his chattel now, his convenience, his dog, his cringing and helpless slave, the humble and unresisting victim of his capricious temper and vicious nature.” Tom deemed this as okay merely because it was socially acceptable to own slaves at the time- not because of any characteristics bestowed upon him at birth. It shows morals, or lack thereof, transcend predetermined things like race.
I believe that Twain’s message throughout this novel was to tear down any argument of nature based difference between whites and blacks. Twain states that one’s race alone doesn’t play a factor in moral righteousness. At a time where this statement would have been perceived as false, it was not only a bold step but a necessary one for Twain to make in order to spread an opinion that is contrary to what was largely believed at the time. Through the concept of swapping children at birth, Puddn’head Wilson provides a new twist on the nature vs nurture argument, firmly supporting the nurture side. This stance preaches that race alone is not a factor in one’s character- teaching American whites a lesson that, at the time, many might not want to have heard.
Great American Novels 2020 