Here I was, a
giant among pigmies, a man among children, a master intelligence among
intellectual moles: by all rational measurement the one and only actually great
man in that whole British world…
A Connecticut
Yankee in King Arthur’s Court was originally titled A Yankee in King Arthur’s
Court. It is a fantasy satire, and I would also say Sci-Fi since it
involves time travel. The eponymous narrator, mechanical engineer Hank Morgan,
is transported from 1879 Connecticut to sixth-century England due to a heavy
blow to his head.
It takes Hank a
while to get his bearings and realize what has happened to him. He is quickly
arrested and sentenced to death, but he uses his superior knowledge of science
and history to convince Arthur and company that he is a powerful wizard. Merlin
challenges him, but Hank always manages to outsmart the charlatan wizard.
Hank embraces
his reputation, earns a position of authority in Arthur’s government, and sets
out to improve the nation of “intellectual moles” he finds himself among.
…to banish
oppression from this land and restore to all its people their stolen rights and
manhood without disobliging anybody.
His aspirations
are not merely scientific. Hank intends to end what, to his 19th-century mind, were
outdated societal norms of serfdom, aristocracy, monarchy, judicial system, and
the Catholic Church.
I was very
happy. Things were working steadily toward a secretly longed-for point. You
see, I had two schemes in my head which were the vastest of all my projects.
The one was to overthrow the Catholic Church and set up the Protestant faith on
its ruins – not as an Established Church, but a go-as-you-please one; and the
other project was to get a decree issued by and by, commanding that upon
Arthur’s death unlimited suffrage should be introduced, and given to men and
women alike – at any rate to all men, wise or unwise, and to all mothers who at
middle age should be found to know nearly as much as their sons at twenty-one.
As one would
expect from Twain, there are moments of subtle and sublime humor. In much of
the book, Hank and Arthur are traveling the realm incognito, and Hank, on
several occasions, has great difficulty in coaching the king on how to act as a
simple peasant.
The King looked
puzzled – he wasn’t a very heavy weight intellectually. His head was an
hour-glass; it could stow an idea, but it had to do it a grain at a time, not
the whole idea at once.
Meanwhile,
there is intrigue in King Arthur’s Court and treachery. There is a great
contest between Hank and his few minions against the entrenched traditions of
Knight Errantry, with a bit of pot-stirring by Merlin. I’ll spare the spoiler of
how it ends.
Overall, I was
disappointed. I’ve loved everything that I’ve read by Twain and wanted to read
this for decades. I expected hilarious dialogue and farcical circumstances but
found only a few bits to snicker at. But it wasn’t merely the doom of high
expectations. I felt that Hank, and by proxy Twain, held humanity in contempt.
But finally it
occurred to me all of a sudden that these animals didn’t reason; that they
never put this and that together…
Well, there are
times when one would like to hang the whole human race and finish the farce.
And yeah, there
are times when I feel that way, but in this novel, that seems to be the
prevalent theme. Not a fan.
Still, it was a
read I needed to check off the list. I’m glad I read it, glad I’m done.
My Rating: 3 ½ out
of 5 Stars
This novel
satisfies the Chess Piece category in the What’s in a Name 2023 Challenge.
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