Mystery
Historical Fiction
The nineteenth century might seem like one big blur to us smartphone-carrying, twenty-first-century readers. But it's super important to recognize that Pudd'nhead Wilson is a novel about early and mid-nineteenth-century America that was written near the tail end of the nineteenth century. This means that the novel has a historical setting, making it an example of—you guessed it—historical fiction.
But what's so super important about that, you ask? Well, it just so happens that a few minor events took place between the time the novel is set and the time in which it was published: the Civil War and the abolition of slavery (yeah, we were kidding about those events being minor). What this means is that Twain is writing about a society in which owning slaves was about as common as wearing clothes—only he's writing about it decades after the U.S. said buh-bye to slavery.
Writing about slavery long after it was abolished might seem like a weird move on Twain's part. After all, who would want to dig up that pretty unpleasant piece of American history as the setting for their novel? Talk about turning readers off. Plus, what in the world did slavery have to do with the lives of the much more enlightened American population of the late nineteenth century who wouldn't dream of owning human beings?
But, c'mon, we're talking about Mark Twain here: the guy knew what he was doing. As critic Peter Messent explains, "Twain's fiction undoubtedly did explore the historical circumstances of late nineteenth-century American life [. . .] But he usually approached such topics in a highly indirect way."
Indeed, reading about the racially prejudiced society in which slavery thrived could prove mighty relevant for Twain's own late nineteenth-century audience. Even though these folks no longer owned slaves, they didn't exactly live in a racially-tolerant climate what with segregation laws booting blacks to the back of train cars and the all too common occurrence of racially motivated lynching well into the twentieth century.
Twain's late nineteenth-century readers could probably stand to learn a few lessons by reading about a society in which racial equality wasn't a reality. It's probably even safe to say that twentieth- and even twenty-first-century readers might benefit from those same lessons as well.
Mystery
Okay, okay, so the crimes that take place in this novel aren't any mystery to us readers. We know full well that it's Tom who's been running all over town disguised in a very girly-girl outfit ripping off stuff from people's houses. And of course we're along for the ride as we get to observe Tom commit his final act of treachery in killing and robbing his poor old uncle.
Nevertheless, Pudd'nhead Wilson focuses on the solution of these crimes, which places it squarely within the mystery genre. And we readers likely derive just as much pleasure from watching Pudd'nhead put the pieces together to solve the crime as we would from figuring it out ourselves.
This isn't to say, though, that Pudd'nhead's process of crime-solving is as glamorous as what we might see on a rerun of Law and Order. Pudd'nhead's road to cracking the murder case is, in fact, full of frustrations and dead ends:
Wilson mooned around, thinking, thinking, guessing, guessing, day and night, and arriving nowhere. (19.31)
Geez, solving crimes seems about as fun as cleaning your bedroom.
By observing his process, though, we see that Pudd'nhead's perseverance pays off. We, along with the folks of Dawson's Landing, are witness to his brilliant, step-by-step explanation of the crime in the closing chapter of the novel.
Don't you feel smarter just watching this Pudd'nhead guy?