The Prince and the Pauper · Chapter
Tom's Progress explained
While the true king Edward wanders in poverty and hardship, Tom Canty grows increasingly comfortable and delighted with his royal role.
What happens
While the true king Edward wanders in poverty and hardship, Tom Canty grows increasingly comfortable and delighted with his royal role. He loses his fears, enjoys the pomp and ceremony, and begins to wield power with confidence, even commanding nobles and defending the oppressed. However, he is occasionally haunted by guilt over the lost prince and his own family, though these thoughts fade as his coronation approaches.
Themes in this chapter
Power and Corruption
Tom's growing comfort with royal power and his enjoyment of adulation and luxury show how power can corrupt even a kind heart.
Identity and Appearance
Tom's transformation from pauper to king highlights the theme of mistaken identity and the power of outward appearance.
Compassion and Empathy
Tom remains a champion of the oppressed and makes war on unjust laws, but his empathy for the true prince and his family fades over time.
Characters to notice
- Tom Canty
Tom grows into his royal role, enjoying the luxury, ceremony, and power, but feels occasional guilt about the true prince and his family.
- Edward VI
The true king is wandering poorly clad and hungry, wedged among a crowd watching coronation preparations at Westminster Abbey.
- Bet
Tom orders the Lady Elizabeth and Lady Jane Grey into his presence for play or talk, and dismisses them with royal authority.
- Henry VIII
Referenced as the 'august late father' whose prisons held sixty thousand convicts and who executed seventy-two thousand thieves.
- Lord Hertford
Implied as the Lord Protector whose mouthpiece Tom initially seems to be, though Tom learns to enjoy being more than that.
Key passages
“He worked the whipping-boy mine to ever-increasing profit.”
He took full advantage of having a whipping-boy to avoid punishment.
Tom exploits the system of a whipping-boy for his own benefit.
“He remained kind and gentle, and a sturdy and determined champion of all that were oppressed, and he made tireless war upon unjust laws”
He stayed compassionate and fought against unfair laws and for the oppressed.
Tom's innate goodness persists despite his new power.
“the thought of their coming some day in their rags and dirt, and betraying him with their kisses, and pulling him down from his lofty place, and dragging him back to penury and degradation and the slums, made him shudder.”
He feared his family would one day recognize him and ruin his new life.
Tom's guilt and fear of exposure cause him to dread his family's arrival.