SummaryMark Twain’s Pudd’nhead Wilson is a detective story in which David Wilson
solves a murder case with fingerprinting technology. Although he identifies a murdererin court, the murderer is sold “down the river” as a piece of property because he is aBlack slave. This book is focused on the problems of mulattos and the irrationalclassification of Whites and Blacks.
While this book was published in 1894, the story is set in the antebellum South.
It highlights the problems of slavery, and racial discrimination which had become
severer, even around 30 years after the Civil War. Miscegenation became prohibited in
the middle of 17th century because Blacks were regarded as being inferior to Whites.
Two mulattos appear in this story: One is a one-sixteenth black-blooded mother, Roxana(Roxy) and the other a one thirty-second black-blooded son, Valet de Chambre (FalseTom). Both of them are Black slaves because a child’s social standing is dependent upon
his/her mother based on “a fiction of law and custom” in the South. The point is that aperson being considered Black depends on the percentage of Black blood. Before theCivil War a one-fourth or one-eighth black-blooded person was regarded as Black.
However, at the end of 19th century a person who had even one drop of Black blood was
being classified as Black according to the “one-drop rule” after the passage of the Jim
Crow laws and the “separate but equal” doctrine. Therefore, this rule is applied to thisstory intentionally. In the beginning of the story, Roxy replaces her own son with her
White master’s son, Tom, both of whom are born on the same day.
Twain’s criticisms of racial discrimination are illustrated in four ways. First,mulattos are categorized as Black, even though they have both “whiteness” and“blackness.” In Roxy’s case “blackness” is shown concerning hatred of Whites, theft,superstition, devotion to the Black church, etc. On the other hand, her attitudes andappearances are mixed “blackness” with “whiteness.” However, she represents“whiteness” regarding duals which are traditionally fixed in the pseudoaristocraticsociety. Concerning the other mulatto, False Tom, since he is raised as White, he isWhite mentally and physically, except his short-term mental change soon after he finds
his mother, Roxy, a Black slave.
Second, the fingerprinting technology that Francis Galton, a eugenist, was going
to prove racial differences scientifically and failed to do so at the end of 19th century, isused in this book just like the “one-drop rule.” Fingerprinting technology proves thatFalse Tom is a murderer. However, once he is a Black slave, he becomes a piece ofproperty. Finally he is sold “down the river,” which means the Deep South, where slaves

are treated harshly. Twain points out that fingerprints don’t show Tom’s identity as anindividual, but his social identity which is created in the South.
Third,Twain

describes

Wilson’sidentity

whichbecomesintermingled“Northernness” with “Southernness” after a 23 year stay. In addition to originallycoming from New York, Wilson takes fingerprints from anyone including Blacks, whichindicates “Northernness.” However, he expresses “Southernness,” when he supports theSouth’s traditional duels. Besides, he doesn’t protest against the unreasonable
treatment of False Tom, which shows Twain’s criticism of the South’s “law and custom.”Finally, Twain himself turned from a Southerner to a Northerner after he fledfrom the South. In the process his attitude to the South changed and he criticized theobsessively traditional South in some books. However, he doesn’t criticize American
society directly because of his own financial situation, his literary background and thesocial situation at the end of 19th century.
As mentioned above, Twain criticizes American society implicitly for making
White-and-Black society without mulattos like the South where White-and-Blacksociety was made by purging free Blacks in the antebellum South. Therefore, In

Pudd’nhead Wilson lurks Mark Twain’s criticism of racial discrimination with theirrational categorization of Blacks and Whites succeeding from the antebellum South at
the end of 19th century.