A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court Themes

SYNOPSIS

Mark Twain, the author and narrator of the tale, is on a visit to Warwick Castle, England,
when he meets a stranger. The stranger, introducing himself as Hank Morgan from
Connecticut, hands Twain a manuscript that he claims to have written during the sixth
century, thirteen hundred years earlier, about his life during that time. He explains that he was
injured in a fight and woke in Camelot, the court of King Arthur. What follows is his story
about Camelot and the effect that he, a man of the nineteenth century, had on society of that
time.

In his story, he reveals that he used his own nineteenth century understanding of technology
and industry to try and revolutionize the crude country ways of the medieval people. As a
result of his much more modern behavior and understanding, he was thought to be a magician
whom the medieval men soon grew accustomed to calling The Boss.

His narrative, which begins in Chapter 2, starts from the moment of waking in Camelot.
When he wakes, he is immediately captured by a Knight and led to the city. Once there, he is
sentenced to die for speaking impertinently to the knight, whom he thinks is insane. Using his
knowledge of astronomy, he remembers an eclipse that is about to happen and tells the
superstitious people of Camelot that he will blot out the sun if he is not released. When the
eclipse happens, the people think he is a terribly powerful magician. He is released and given
a position of honor in society. The Kings primary magician, Merlin, is jealous and skeptical
of this new magician, and openly declares he is a fraud. The Boss, in an effort to bolster his
position and humiliate the old magician, declares he will cause lightning from the sky to blow
up Merlins tower. With a few of his supporters, he produces explosives and a lightning rod
and proceeds to put on a magnificent show of blowing up the old magicians tower.

Just when he is basking under the glory of power and position, he is challenged by Sir
Sagramour Le Desirous to fight a duel in a tournament. However, the date is unspecified
since Sagramour is leaving to find the Holy Grail. The King and other Knights insist that the
Boss must also go on a quest to prove his eligibility to face Sir Sagramour. He requests some
time before he leaves in order to introduce education and technology in Camelot. With the
help of Clarence he thus establishes schools, military academies, factories, telephones and
telegraph operations, making Camelot very much like nineteenth century England. He does
all this without the consent or knowledge of the church, which very much opposes
modernizing Camelot since it will make the people more difficult to rule.
Finally, it is time for The Boss to start his quest. He accompanies Demoiselle Alisande Le
Carteloise, or Sandy, on a mission to free her mistress and forty-four princesses from
captivity. Burdened with a heavy armor, The Boss braves heat, exhaustion, the continuous
chatter of Sandy, and a horde of Knights to reach the castle of Morgan le Fay. Morgan is
pleasant to look at but cruel in her attitude to her subordinates. The Boss wins her favor by
projecting himself as a powerful magician and moves on. They encounter various difficulties
and meet many mythical people, including the notorious Morgan LeFay of Camelot lore. At
some point, they are summoned to the Valley where the pilgrims meet, since there is a
problem with the Holy Well and the people believe only The Boss can help.

When they reach the Valley, the boss realizes that the problem is a mere leak. Still he uses the
ignorance of the people to his advantage. He informs the monks that he can work a miracle
that will bring back the water to the well. He orders equipment and help from Camelot and
waits till Merlin gives up trying to fix it with his magic. Then The Boss secretly begins to
repair the hole in the well. Soon after the work is completed, he exhibits his miracle with
pomp and show to a large audience. Once more he is successful and much admired for his
skill.

The King comes to the Holy Valley to do his work there and he and The Boss decide to take a
trip together. They both disguise themselves in order to travel incognito. The King finds it
difficult to act the part of a peasant, since his pampered nature and royal breeding seem
inseparable from his personality. He witnesses firsthand the cruelty of his knights toward the
common man, and since he himself is disguised as a commoner, he is often the brunt of their
misdeeds. He and The Boss encounter several tragic stories among the poverty stricken
people. They also find themselves in frequent trouble.

The King and The Boss come upon a burning house where a man has been killed. Someone
tells them the dead man is the Lord of the Manor, who has been killed by three peasants that
he wrongfully put in prison. The peasants, on escaping prison, set his house on fire and killed
him.

The Boss befriends some people in the town, but cannot resist showing off his wealth and
superior knowledge in front of others. The peasants are suspicious of him and the King. A
ruckus ensues and the King and The Boss are forced to flee. They are rescued from an angry
mob by an Earl, but find that he has saved them only so that he may sell them as slaves. From
that point, their hardships only multiply. They bear the brunt of the severe climate as well as
the wrath of their master. The King, who in the past had made his subjects slaves, is now the
slave of his own cruel master.

The Boss manages to escape but is caught before he can rescue The King. He is taken to
court, where he concocts a story about being the servant of a noble man and is thus released
(since the courts are biased in favor nobility and the clergy). He then contacts Clarence on the
telephone and asks him to send Knights to rescue the King from the prison cell. When he
reaches the market place, he learns that the slaves had killed their cruel master and are now
going to be executed. Before he can do anything to help, he is also captured and corralled for
execution.

In the open courtyard, three of the prisoners are executed and the King awaits his turn.
Suddenly, the Knights led by Sir Launcelot arrive to free His Majesty and The Boss. Rescued,
they all return to Camelot. The King has gained more sympathy for his subjects, having
experienced firsthand the hardships of being a commoner in a country that favors clergy and
nobility. But the trials are not over for The Boss. Sir Sagramour has returned from his search
for the Holy Grail, and is ready to duel. The Boss defeats Sagramour, as well as many other
outraged Knights (including Launcelot) who are too proud to see a lowly man defeat the
much lauded Knights. Still, The Boss emerges victorious over all

Shortly after this incident, the boss starts revolutionizing England with his forward-looking
policies and technical skills. He openly encourages enrollment in schools and other
institutions like the military academy. He popularizes telephone, telegraph, and railways.
Slowly and steadily he realizes his dream of making Camelot into a modern city. He now
nurtures ambitions of making England a republic. He marries Sandy and they have a
daughter. She becomes ill and the doctor urges him to take the child out of the country, to the
sea. The Boss complies, and spends about a month away from Camelot.

When their daughter recovers enough, The Boss leaves for Camelot, promising to return for
his wife and daughter. But Camelot is not as he had left it. England is gloomy and dark. His
inventions and implements are out of use and he observes fear in the eyes of the people. Soon
he realizes that the church has taken over the state in his absence and an Interdict has been
issued against him. On reaching Camelot, he gathers information about the sequence of
events leading to the Interdict. Sir Launcelot, after manipulating the shares, had antagonized
other knights. He had also angered the King by openly expressing his affection for the queen.
A war resulted between the King and the other knights against Launcelot. The King was
killed, the queen vowed to live as a nun, and all The Bosss progress had been undone.
Except for a small army of young men (about fifty) that Clarence had organized, there was no
one left to fight this coup.

The Boss, Clarence, and the small group of rebels lay a trap for the knights by hiding in a
cave equipped with explosives. They lure the knights there and promptly defeat them. The
Boss is stabbed when he tries to help one of the knights he has wounded. At that time, Merlin
casts a spell on him, causing him to fall asleep for thirteen hundred years. In this way the tale
of the Connecticut Yankee in King Arthurs court ends. The novel closes as it began--with the
encounter between Mark Twain with the stranger. Twain has finished reading the manuscript
and goes to meet the stranger in order to return the manuscript. Hank Morgan is on his
deathbed and in his delirious state remembers Sandy and his daughter Hello-Central. He
longs to return to Camelot and experience its idyllic charm, regardless of the fact that he had
once thought it crude and undeveloped.

THEMES
Major Theme

The major theme of the novel is the clash of science with superstition. Hank Morgan
revolutionizes sixth century Arthurian England by introducing the science and technology of
the nineteenth century. He makes his views on the crude superstitions of the medieval men
quite obvious and seeks to modernize them with science and industry. His flaw, however, is
using science for his own power at the expense of the people. With his simple knowledge of
technology, he does things the medieval men think are magical, and he lets them continue in
that misconception. Therefore, he encourages their belief in magic for his own personal
elevation. This is a complication of the theme of science and superstition, but one that
deserves serious consideration and discussion.

Minor Themes

There are a few minor themes in the novel like environmental determinism and the defeat of
pride and haste. As in The Prince and the Pauper, it is apparent that environment determines
the actions of the people. The inmates of Camelot are overpowered by religion and are
blinded by the authority of the church. Being born and brought up in such an environment,
they accept the Divine right of Kings and the unjust laws of the land with very little
resistance. King Arthur is a wise king and appreciates the enterprise of Hank Morgan but he
respects nobility even though they are unintelligent and upholds the authority of the Church
even when it is very obviously biased. Even as he travels incognito with The Boss, he
occasionally asserts such imperialistic views. However, after experiencing the agony of being
a slave and his own imminent death, he protests against slavery and capital punishment.
Circumstances make him change his views on the unjust laws of the land.

The defeat of pride and haste is another conspicuous theme in the novel. Hank Morgans
pride in his superior knowledge makes him display his powers and crave attention. Even
though he earns the approval of many, he antagonizes others by his arrogance. His pride also
makes him blind to the feelings of simple and illiterate people. He has become like the
nobility and clergy he detests. It is no wonder that during his absence from Camelot, he is
isolated by the church and punished for his pride.

Hank Morgan wounds the sentiments of the Church and shocks the superstitious people with
his revolutionary ideas. In his hurry to modernize Camelot and take the sixth century towards
the nineteenth century, he forgets to understand the spirit of the age and the framework of its
society. Haste thus wastes the efforts of Morgan, devastates an idyllic land, and hastens his
own end.

Slavery

Twain railed against slavery in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and showed no signs of
slowing down in A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. The peasants in Arthur's time
are present enslaved by circumstance: calling themselves free, but still bound to their land and ruler,
and unable to act as they wish. Hank hates slavery, and makes freeing everyone in England a big
priority. It's tough goingArthur needs to become enslaved himself before he understands it as a
problemand made all the more difficult by the fact that things like ignorance and fear enslave
people in the book just as often as iron chains.

Technology and Modernization

Technology is largely a symbol of Hank's knowledge, which is to say that he uses it as a

means of improving the world around himas the medieval world gains more and more
technology, life improve by leaps and bounds in A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court . At
the same time though, in the Battle of the Sandbar, technology kills so many people that Hank and his
friends end up trapped by the sheer wall of bodies. Knowledge and technology have their limits, it
seem, even with someone as clever as the Yankee.

The Supernatural

Superstition is not the way, as Stevie Wonder tells us, and A Connecticut Yankee in King
Arthur's Court does a great job of showing us why. Belief in magic, ogres, witchcraft, and
devils creates fear in the Arthurian world, which people like Merlin and the Church use to control
people. We don't actually get the supernatural much herein Twain's mind, it's hogwashbut
people's belief in it still plays a huge part in the book. Hank's ability to see through superstitionto
view the ogres as pigs and the magic as a confidence gamegives him the power to solve a
staggering number of problems. But even he can't get rid of it entirely: he has to pretend he's a wizard
when doing his thing so that the people he helps won't freak out.
GENRE

On first reading, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court is fantasy, with the Yankee
whisked away through unknown means to a far off land. We call it fantasy because this story
tell about Hank Morgan from Connecticut, when he wake up he was in another time and
place. It was in sixth century, when King Arthur was the leader of British. Besides that story
is also about satire. It was told the critical to church that always meddles all aspect, like
government, science, society, economy, etc. the church in the middle age against
modernization and developing of science because it can make men hardly managed.

SETTING

Like most stories involving time travel and historical transcendence, A Connecticut Yankee in
King Arthurs Court takes liberties with geography and history. The novel makes use of both
geographical and historical settings, framed in one time and place and taking place primarily
in another. Geographically, the novel opens and closes in and around Warwick Castle,
England. The Castle is a tourist spot, and the narrator Mark Twain presumably meets the
principal character, Hank Morgan, while sightseeing. Hank Morgan shares his story with the
narrator in Warwick Castle and a hotel room. The exterior frame of the novel (made up of the
first and last chapters) takes place over a period of a day and a half. Historically, this exterior
frame is set in nineteenth century England.

The bulk of the novel, however, takes place in the historic Camelot of the sixth century and in
and around both the English countryside and Europe, where Hank Morgan claims to have
lived in the past. Camelot is an ancient city with fortified castles, cozy inns, and verdant
pastoral landscapes. The people are primal in inventions, having few of the luxuries of
nineteenth century England. Camelot makes up the court of the historic King Arthur, where
chivalrous knights, damsels in distress, and poor subjects at the mercy of the King and the
Church dwell. The Orthodox Catholic Church makes up the laws of the land and has
established the Divine right of Kings. The royalty live in luxury, while the common man
struggles to make ends meet. The protagonist of the novel, Hank Morgan, finds himself
constantly comparing this primal time and country to the recently industrialized and
technologically advanced one of the nineteenth century. The novel is basically a juxtaposition
of the old and the new, the pure and the developed. Hank Morgan spends most of the novel
trying to transform Camelot into an advanced civilization, then spends the last moments of
his life wishing he could return to the purer time in the past.

LITERARY/HISTORICAL INFORMATION

A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthurs Court is regarded as one of the greatest satires of
American Literature. Mark Twain wrote this novel in order to expose the ignorance and
supersti tion of the English people and the rigidity of the Roman Catholic Church. In his
original preface to the novel, he wrote My object has been to group together some of the
most odious laws which have had vogue in the Christian countries within the past eight or ten
centuries, and illustrate them by the incidents of a story. Mark Twain speaks vehemently
against the Divine right of Kings, the Christian orthodoxy, and the cruel laws and customs
of the medieval England.

A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthurs Court is classified as a historical novel as it throws

light on the medieval England of King Arthur and his Round Table. Mark Twain was familiar
with the Arthurian Romances, Tennysons Idylls of the King and Malorys La Morte d Arthur.
In fact, the opening chapter of the novel relates a passage from Malorys book. He borrows
heavily from legend and previous literary efforts in his satire.

Though historical in content, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthurs Court is a fantasy in that
it relates the autobiography of Hank Morgan supposedly told to the author, Mark Twain--that
is, it makes a pretense of non-fiction.

The novel has often been referred to as a magnificent failure because the book fails to make
significant moral observations. Mark Twain reveals his confused views in the novel. The
protagonist of the story displays contradiction between his thought and action. Hank Morgan,
disgusted with the ignorance and superstition of the people, decides to enlighten them with
education and technology. However, in order to achieve this purpose, he poses as a great
magician who can work miracles, using the peoples superstition to his advantage.
Similarly, Morgan condemns the barbaric customs and crude traditions of medieval England
that make men beasts and subjects slaves. In the end, it is he who devastates an idyllic
country with quiet charm, transforming it into a brutal battlefield, echoing with the sounds of
guns and artillery. Finally, after defeating twenty-five thousand knights with his scientific
skills, he is at last overpowered by the same magician whom he had proudly vanquished
earlier. The last chapter of the novel shows the stranger, on his deathbed, deliriously wishing
to go back to the sixth century. Hank Morgan, who had always admired the modern and
developed world of the nineteenth century, wishes to go back to the ancient city of Camelot.
What an ironic end!

A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthurs Court, for all its moralizing and contradictions still
satisfies the comic bent of is readers. As Harry R. Warfel rightly avers, Hanks adventures
provoke hearty laughter and keep the story going at high-speed; yet there are frequent
homespun satirical observations and shocking incidents that cause the reader to pause
thoughtfully, even angrily, and reconsider his own relationship to his fellowmen. Mark
Twain has convincingly exposed the evils of medieval society by interestingly weaving a
story around it with humor and irony.
 Comparative literature

A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court Themes

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ENGLISH LITERATURE (GENAP)

FACULTY CULTURAL STUDIES

2016