A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court

1889, undated but probably 1960s Signet Classic edition
Mark Twain
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court
Original price $1.75, bought used for unknown
Ratty paperback
C+

As even Edmund Reiss's afterword admits, this is an uneven book, and it works less for me than it does for him.  I like some of the social satire/commentary, like how Twain draws parallels between 6th-century serfs and 19th-century slaves.  The use of modern technology, like bicycles and telephones is cute, and tends to be what I most remember about this novel.  (I must've seen a movie adaptation or two in my youth.)   But then the Yankee uses technology to unrepentantly kill off thousands of noblemen.  He promises freedom of religion, in the sense that everyone will be Protestant.  He promises democracy, then names himself dictator after King Arthur dies.

Now, probably Twain meant Hank Morgan to be an unreliable narrator, but as with The Egoist, that doesn't mean I want to spend time with the title character.  Also, Twain and/or Morgan cheats the reader by skipping ahead three years, so that now "Sandy" (the Lady Alisandre) has gone from an annoyingly talkative woman to a loving and supportive wife.  Admittedly, we don't read Twain for the romance, but I've never seen courtship by the main character glossed over so much.

Also, the story is riddled with anachronisms and/or mythic missteps, like London being a city when it's supposed to be all about Camelot.  Twain can't make up his mind whether this is a satire of the fantasy world of knights (sort of from the opposite perspective of Don Quixote) or a criticism of the real Dark Ages.  If the latter, then he didn't do the research, because it sounds more like the Middle Ages of four or five centuries later.  Also, Morgan somehow knows the eclipses of the 500s.  Maybe we're not meant to take this too seriously, but then there are the parts that are meant seriously.

All that said, it's not a bad book.  Clarence writes the last chapter and I did enjoy his character.  It might've been a better book if Clarence had been in it more.