Biblical Allusions in "The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg"
Let me start this blog post by
saying I am in no way religious in any way, but through the works of Mark Twain
in The Complete Short Stories, my
interest has been somewhat peaked. In many of Twain’s stories that we have
covered so far, he has paralleled and made allusions to religion – specifically
Christianity - and stories in the bible. I would like to focus on the
parallelism to the bible in Twain’s “The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg”. It can
be argued that “The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg” concurs with the story of
Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.
Twain opens the story of “The Man that
Corrupted Hadleyburg” in an “incorruptible” “honorable supremacy”; a town
called Hadleyburg (420). The “unsmirched” reputation and honesty of this town comes
from the eradication of temptation for “three generations” running (419).
Hadleyburg closely resembles the Garden of Eden, where Adam and Eve live a pure
and honest life because they have not had any experience with evil. A stranger
enters the town of Hadleyburg, regarded highly for being honesty and upright,
and is treated wrong. Angry by the way he was treated, this stranger engineers
a plan for revenge; to expose what he has experienced. The stranger concocts a
plot to “comprehend the entire town, and not let so much as one person escape
unhurt” by introducing its most pious citizens to temptation (420). The
stranger is an allusion to the Serpent that corrupts Adam and Eve in Eden. The
Serpent tempts and then persuades Eve to eat the forbidden fruit, resulting in
Adam and Eve being banished from Eden. This is similar to the consequences
faced by the men and women of Hadleyburg, when they are introduced to
temptation and their golden reputation is forever lost.
It
is clear to see the parallels in “The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg” and the
story of the Garden of Eden, but is this what Twain wanted us to see? My interpretation of this text and this allusion were fortified, however, until our class discussion on
Thursday. Is that what Twain wanted
us to see? Or was he trying to point out something quite the opposite? Was
the town really honest, if they had never known temptation? Or was the town
dishonest from the get-go?
Works Cited:
Twain, Mark. The Complete Short Stories of Mark Twain. New York: Bantam Books, 1957. Print.
I am also not a religious person and when I was reading "The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg" I did not see this connection. I think this may be because my lack of religious knowledge or awareness because once this topic was brought up in class I was also able to see the connection. I defiantly see the parallelism you mentioned between Twains story and the biblical story. While I personally don't think that this story was supposed to mock the story of Adam and Eve I think that he may have gotten his inspiration from the tale.
ReplyDeleteYour questions at the end of your blog stumped me too. Looking back, in my opinion I think the town was already somewhat tainted by greed and dishonesty. Mr. Richards new the truth about Burgess and that he was an honest man, but when he was dubbed "guilty" Mr. Richards never spoke up in the fear of tainting his reputation. An honest man would have come forward to help prove the mans innocence. It's almost like they have so much pride to try and uphold their reputation, that the town does dishonest things to contain it.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you that there definitely is a parallel in this story to the one seen in Genesis. I think Twain's key idea is to point out the flaws of human nature, The town of Hadleyburg seems fake throughout the story because of the fact that they have not been presented the choice to do wrong, as did Adam and Eve in the Garden prior to Satan's visit. The concept of 'Free Will' is not really tested until this man presents the temptation. Twain is known for poking fun at the religious culture of the time period, and does so by comparing this virtuous and morally sound town of citizens into a greedy 'House of Cards' where even the most righteous are bound to fall.
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