"What am I writing? A historical tale of 300 years ago, simply for the love of it." Mark Twain's "tale" became his first historical novel, The Prince and the Pauper, published in 1881. Intricately plotted, it was intended to have the feel of history even though it was only the stuff of legend. In sixteenth-century England, young Prince Edward (son of Henry VIII) and Tom Canty, a pauper boy who looks exactly like him, are suddenly forced to change places. The prince endures "rags & hardships" while the pauper suffers the "horrible miseries of princedom." Mark Twain called his book a "tale for young people of all ages," and it has become a classic of American literature.

The first edition in 1881 was fully illustrated by Frank Merrill, John Harley, and L. S. Ipsen. The boys in these illustrations, Mark Twain said, "look and dress exactly as I used to see them cast in my mind... It is a vast pleasure to see them cast in the flesh, so to speak." This Mark Twain Library edition exactly reproduces the text of the California scholarly edition, including all of the 192 illustrations that so pleased the author.

• We started tracking this book on July 24, 2013.
• This book was £13.95 when we started tracking it.
• The price of this book has changed 121 times in the past 3,787 days.
• The current price of this book is £2.84 last checked one day ago.
• This lowest price this book has been offered at in the past 90 days is £2.76.
• This lowest price this book has been offered at in the past six months is £2.38.
• This lowest price this book has been offered at in the past year is £2.02.
• The lowest price to date was £1.20 last reached on April 29, 2019.
• This book has been £1.20 one time since we started tracking it.
• The highest price to date was £19.06 last reached on March 14, 2020.
• This book has been £19.06 one time since we started tracking it.

• Literature & FictionClassicsAmerican
• Literature & FictionClassicsHistorical

• Text-to-Speech: Enabled
• Lending: Disabled
• Print Length: 344 Pages
• File Size: 14,934 KB