The Adventures of Tom Sawyer in Catching up on Classics (and lots more!)

Aug 08, 2021 Kenny rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, classics, young-adult, mark-twain, big-book-reads-2021

Who knows, he may grow up to be President someday, unless they hang him first!
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer ~~~ Mark Twain

Selected by Kenny for August 2021 Big Book Read (In August I am reading the entire Tom & Huck Series as well as Life on the Mississippi & Huck Out West

Buddy read with Aesaan

Random thought: I love returning to Mark Twain’s Mississippi Universe. I grow to love it more with each repeated reading.

Another thought: Tom Sawyer is so different than Huck Finn. This requires a very d ...more

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Oct 01, 2020 Julie rated it did not like it · review of another edition

Shelves: fin-2020, classic-novels

I don't get it. Why is this considered an enduring American classic? Also, this doesn't read as a children's book though apparently it is? I can easily think of a dozen 19th century/early 20th century children's books and none of them are negative and disturbing like Tom Sawyer. Was this written for adults and then repurposed as a book for children? It's no Anne of Green Gables or Little Women.

I read this because it's known as an amazing American classic everyone should read and I figured I shou I don't get it. Why is this considered an enduring American classic? Also, this doesn't read as a children's book though apparently it is? I can easily think of a dozen 19th century/early 20th century children's books and none of them are negative and disturbing like Tom Sawyer. Was this written for adults and then repurposed as a book for children? It's no Anne of Green Gables or Little Women.

I read this because it's known as an amazing American classic everyone should read and I figured I should join the bandwagon and read it even though I was familiar with the plot from seeing the 1970's Disney movie version of it so many times. For once, the movie is better than the book.

I knew going into it that this book uses the n word but I thought it would be used solely as a descriptor. I didn't realize it said stuff like "All n*ggers are liars". Wow. I am not big on censoring or editing an artist but how does that sentence further the story? What is lost by removing that sentence?And if it is left in, how is it 'fostering a discussion about race'? Does the teacher then talk about how there are a lot of white Americans who think black people are less than they are and still think that way? Good luck with not getting parents angry with that conversation. Others say leave that sentence in because it is part of Twain's story and he wanted it in there. Hopefully that sentence is not indicative of Twain's work in general or an example of his brilliant writing. Reading it was like a bucket of cold water was dumped on my head.

Then there is Huck describing a black man who would share his food with Huck. He panics that he has told Tom this, saying "Sometimes I've set right down and eat with him. But you needn't tell that. A body's got to do things when he's awful hungry he wouldn't want to do as a steady thing." UGH. I mean, God forbid you sit down and eat with a black person. Gross!

I kept thinking about how these comments are just the 19th century version of today's racism. Calling all BLM protesters "thugs, looters, criminals, rioters" while excusing cops who murder as just doing their jobs = "All n*ggers are liars". Not wanting to sit down & eat a meal with a black person = not wanting to go to school with one/they only got accepted to this school cause they are black etc. Go google College Humor's great parody commercial for Diet Racism! to see the modern version of white people in Tom Sawyer.

And then there is the animal abuse. I understand that in the 19th century people treated animals differently. They were thought to not be able to feel pain because they didn't have souls. Still, reading about the cat Tom & his friends tie up, tightly winding a cloth around the animal's mouth so it can't cry out, was not a funny hardy-har moment that Mark Twain wrote it to be. All I could think about was the 3 indicators of a serial killer - bedwetting, fire starting and animal abuse. Oh that rascally Tom!

I could not wait for this book to be over. I bought Huck Finn at the same time, thinking I'd read both, but now I am rethinking that decision. There are many, many, many brilliant amazing 19th century classics that don't hit you over the head with negative portrayals of black people or the abuse of house pets. I suggest you go read one of those instead.

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May 15, 2019 Kelly_Hunsaker_reads ... rated it liked it

Shelves: read-in-2019, classics, read-in-2022, childrens, american-lit, adventure, 60-before-60

Although I have been familiar with the storyline of this classic I have never read it. Two years ago I read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn for the first time and was enchanted. This one I enjoyed, but not nearly as much as Huck Finn.

Tom Sawyer was published in 1876 and set in the 1840s. The era is vividly seen as the language is so different than the English we speak today. The games the children play, the chores they do, the way the adults speak to - and about - the children, are all so dis Although I have been familiar with the storyline of this classic I have never read it. Two years ago I read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn for the first time and was enchanted. This one I enjoyed, but not nearly as much as Huck Finn.

Tom Sawyer was published in 1876 and set in the 1840s. The era is vividly seen as the language is so different than the English we speak today. The games the children play, the chores they do, the way the adults speak to - and about - the children, are all so distinctive. And yet the kids are silly, precocious, and sassy in the same ways of today's children. The book is accessible and fun to read. I love the way he described Huck in one quick, beautiful sentence. The reader immediately knows that this friendship will lead to trouble.

"Huckleberry was cordially hated and dreaded by all the mothers of the town because he was idle, and lawless, and vulgar, and bad - and because all their children admired him so, and delighted in his forbidden society, and wished they dared to be like him."

Mark Twain shows his wit throughout both books, and in this one I most enjoyed the little snippets where the narrator breaks the fourth wall and speaks directly to the audience. In those moments I picture Twain's face and see him speaking directly to me with a knowing grin. The last two lines are a perfect example as he tells me that there is more to the story, but he will probably write that later so he cannot tell me now! This made me smile and think that I may need to read Huck Finn again.

"When one writes a novel about grown people, he knows exactly where to stop – that is, with a marriage; but when he writes of juveniles, he must stop where he best can..."

One of the things I liked best in any book is when an author writes about a setting in a way that transports me to the time and place. In this book Twain did just that. I found myself in a beautiful, hot, summer on the Mississippi river. For example:

“Saturday morning was come, and all the summer world was bright and fresh, and brimming with life. There was a song in every heart; and if the heart was young, the music issued at the lips. There was cheer in every face and a spring in every step. The locust-trees were in bloom, and the fragrance of the blossoms filled the air. Cardiff Hill, beyond the village and above, it was green with vegetation, and it lay just far enough away to seem a Delectable Land, dreamy, reposeful, and inviting.”

The book can be read in a day. The chapters are short and this would be a great book to read to children -- but please go with the unabridged!

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Jun 13, 2017 Maggie rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: usa, coming-of-age, guardian-1000, to-reread, fiction, adventure, classics, humour

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Written “mainly for the entertainment of boys an girls”, and to “pleasantly remind adults of what they once were themselves, and of how they felt and thought and talked, and what queer enterprises they sometimes engaged in”, Tom Sawyer tells of the titular character, a mischievous and vexatious but nevertheless good-hearted boy and his antics. In between playing pirates and playing truant with his friends Joe Harper and Huckleberry Finn, throwing dirt at his brother Sid, playing pranks on his Au Written “mainly for the entertainment of boys an girls”, and to “pleasantly remind adults of what they once were themselves, and of how they felt and thought and talked, and what queer enterprises they sometimes engaged in”, Tom Sawyer tells of the titular character, a mischievous and vexatious but nevertheless good-hearted boy and his antics. In between playing pirates and playing truant with his friends Joe Harper and Huckleberry Finn, throwing dirt at his brother Sid, playing pranks on his Aunt Polly and escaping punishments, and “courting” Becky Thatcher, he and his friends manage to be attendants at their own funerals, witness a murder, and find hidden gold.

All of us have known Tom Sawyers. He is the caricature of a naughty little boy, cheeky and mischievous, wanting nothing better than to play and have fun. He and his friends pretend to be a bad lot – they talk about being pirates and robbers, and dream of stealing and killing. Yet their “badness” has a quality of innocence about it. A lot of it stems from pride – they don’t actually want to kill and steal, they just want to show off and be well-known and envied. They know where the line is drawn, and what is most redeeming is that the line is drawn not by rules and punishments, as their parents and guardians believe, but by love – it is okay to run away from home for days, but it is not okay to run away from home if it makes your Aunt cry. When Tom does step across the line, as he often does unintentionally, he makes efforts to toe it more carefully the next time. And despite his disdain for church and prayer, he does believe in God, and trembles at the thought of dying when he thinks about how bad he has been.

Drawn from real people, the characters in this book are very real and believable, even if their stories and circumstances are incredible. Tom, a composite of three boys that Mark Twain knew, has remarkably real thoughts. For instance, he has melodramatic hopes of dying so that Becky would cry over his body, yet he wishes that “he could only die temporarily!” How many of us, influenced by books and movies, have had similar thoughts, especially in our youth? And how many of us would, like Tom, never admit these thoughts, knowing their folly?

If I had a kid, I would be happy if he was like Tom Sawyer. Sure, he would probably give his parents lots of misery, but Tom’s relationship for Aunt Polly is touching, and despite the fact that he probably gets poor grades in school, he’s street-smart, ambitious and a great motivator of his friends. When Huck Finn declines respectability for living in rags on the street, Tom knows enough to encourage him to attempt again a respectable life by telling him that he wouldn’t be allowed in Tom’s gang otherwise. In his own charming way, he’s caring and intelligent.

The book often made me laugh out loud, even in the train. Mark Twain’s humour is sometimes satirical, sometimes ironical, and sometimes dry, and it’s always spot on. ...more

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