Story, character, setting, and plot are the main elements that combine to form a short story or a novel. These elements, with the language used in presenting them, also combine to create the theme of a work of fiction. Story, character, setting, and plot are always present in any work of fiction, but the emphasis on them varies from work to work. Thus, one work may emphasize the exploration of character, and the other elements will be secondary to that focus. Another work may emphasize the events of the story, while a third may emphasize the setting in which the action takes place.
Of course, theme is important in every fictional work; theme is the basic reason for the existence of a literary work, masterpiece or otherwise. Still, some works give greater direct emphasis to theme than other works do; when this happens, all other elements in the work are subordinate.
The Prince and the Pauper is one of Twain's most tightly plotted novels. In addition, this novel is strongly thematic. Thematically, Twain is particularly interested in contrasting the lives of the rich with the lives of the poor, the lives of the nobility with the lives of the lower classes. At the same time, however, Twain is also interested in showing that a person of noble birth is not essentially different from a person of common birth, even though their lives may seem to be very different. In other words, he wishes to show that a prince dressed in a pauper's clothing will be treated as a prince; in addition, the pauper can do the prince's job very nearly as well as the prince could, if the pauper is given the chance.
This thematic emphasis requires characters of certain kinds, which means that the themes of the novel establish a set of characteristics that the characters must have. Adding to the limitations of characterization established by the themes of the novel, other limitations are added by the requirements of the plot. That is, the characters in this novel must have certain characteristics that will allow them to participate in the action as it develops.
