The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn in Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge

Apr 23, 2011 Jane rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Well, I wouldn't have reread except for book club, but I'm glad I did. Laughed out loud many times during the sections where Huck and Tom are staying at the Phelps plantation. And I'm glad to have read it especially now, when new editions of the book with the word "nigger" being revised to "slave," and "injun" to "Indian," and all the literary and political and educational controversy attached to that decision. I'm talking about race frequently with my students. They now initiate conversations a ...more

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Jan 28, 2015 Bradley rated it really liked it

Shelves: year-2015, year-2015-bookclub

This was my book club selection for February 2015. And I loved that this book sorta had a call back to American Gods because one of the places Huck and Jim visit is Cairo.

Huck Finn is an iconic character and this book has been on my to-read list for years. I'm so glad that I've finally read it.

This book continues almost right where Adventures of Tom Sawyer left off. And while you don't have to read Tom Sawyer before Huck Finn I do think that having prior knowledge of that book helped me understa This was my book club selection for February 2015. And I loved that this book sorta had a call back to American Gods because one of the places Huck and Jim visit is Cairo.

Huck Finn is an iconic character and this book has been on my to-read list for years. I'm so glad that I've finally read it.

This book continues almost right where Adventures of Tom Sawyer left off. And while you don't have to read Tom Sawyer before Huck Finn I do think that having prior knowledge of that book helped me understand Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

The book is about a young boy named Huck Finn. Huck is left to do whatever he wants because Huck's father is the town drunk and rarely around. Huck Finn has recently become a town hero so he's adopted by the widow Douglas. One of the better parts of this book is the struggle that Huck goes through trying to fit into a society he doesn't belong in and Mark Twain makes a valid argument that society will always try to erase and adapt individuals that are outside the box by forcing them to become "sivilised".

Huck finally escapes with a runaway slave named Jim. Huck and Jim travel up the Mississippi trying to reach a place where Jim will be free.

There's been a lot of debate surrounding this book and the use of the word nigger and whether it should be scrubbed clean, as it has in some editions, from the book. The word is vile but it's necessary because it's authentic of the times. It is never used in a hateful or derogatory manner. It is simply used to describe Jim.

This book is strange in the way that slavery is portrayed. Mark Twain doesn't take a stance for or against slavery. Huck Finn is helping Jim escape but Huck Finn has a moral debate about it. Huck feels that he'll go to hell because he helped steal someone's property. It's a harsh history to read this book and be reminded that slaves were property. That Jim's wife and child had been sold. That Jim, despite being old enough to be Huck's father, was treated like a third class citizen. The people they came across gave more respect to the child Huck than the adult Jim.

This book is an American classic and it is beautifully written. But, here in 2015, the laissez faire attitude about slavery didn't set well with me. It was hard to separate the fiction of Mark Twain from the harsh reality that runaway slaves faced. ...more

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