The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn in Reading the Classics

Oct 11, 2022 Andrea rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: bookcrossing, 2022-reads

The excessive use of the N-word was jarring to me (I expected to come across it a few times, but not nearly as frequently as this!), but this is such a fun story, and, I think, an important one in showing the inequalities of life at the time. I started reading it specifically for Banned Books Week, and while I can understand why some people may be uncomfortable with having this book taught in the classroom, I think it is such a good discussion starter, that - with good facilitation - it can be a ...more

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Oct 27, 2012 Drkshadow03 rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: books-read-in-2024, books-i-own-read

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Huck Finn and Jim run away to escape their troubles by sailing on the Mississippi River. Huck Finn wants to escape the restrictive rules and upbringing of Widow Douglas’s attempt to civilize him and the abuse of his drunken good-for-nothing father. So he fakes his own death and heads down the river where he meets up with Jim who wants to escape slavery because Miss Watson has broke her promise not to sell him away from his family. Along the way they find themselves on adventures of survival, cau Huck Finn and Jim run away to escape their troubles by sailing on the Mississippi River. Huck Finn wants to escape the restrictive rules and upbringing of Widow Douglas’s attempt to civilize him and the abuse of his drunken good-for-nothing father. So he fakes his own death and heads down the river where he meets up with Jim who wants to escape slavery because Miss Watson has broke her promise not to sell him away from his family. Along the way they find themselves on adventures of survival, caught up with two conmen who claim to be a long lost Duke and dauphin of France, and join Tom Sawyer and his extended family in order to help Jim escape back to freedom through overly theatrical ridiculous means after he is recaptured.

This is technically a re-read for me, but the last time I read it was 25 years ago as a 16 year old in high school. The early parts read like a kid’s adventure story written in southern dialect, but the later parts involve weightier themes that show the moral hypocrisy of religion and southern attitudes towards slaves and blacks in general, while the ending moves towards the burlesque.

Even “nice” people who own slaves are shown to be hypocrites and corrupted by the institution. Mrs. Watson promises not to sell Jim away from his family, but plans to break her promise when she is given a monetary offer she can’t refuse. Although she feels guilty about this later and decides to free Jim on her deathbed. Likewise, Huck is not immune to racist sentiments, feeling guilty that he is helping Jim, and thinking of him at times in racialized terms. Huck debates right and wrong, especially as it relates to religion and slavery. Huck believes he is doing something immoral by assisting a runaway slave, believing he is jeopardizing his soul to hell, showing that he has become indoctrinated in white southern cultural assumptions. Huck even considers Jim’s plan to take back his wife and children as stealing, but he never considers that enslavement itself is a form of theft in the first place. At the same time, Twain keeps a sharp eye for nuance concerning morality. Lying is something most people would consider immoral, yet Huck’s constant lying, sometimes successful and sometimes less so throughout the narrative, manages to save Jim many times, showing a seemingly bad and condemned behavior such as lying can be used for a moral good, saving a man from enslavement.

The constant use of the n-word may be jarring for many modern readers, but it emphasizes the way Huck and the south dehumanize and view people of color like Jim and other enslaved blacks. This dehumanization contrasts with Huck’s genuine feelings for his friend Jim and Jim’s intelligence in the form of common sense that tempers or at least notices the sometimes questionable logic of the white characters around him. Likewise, his obvious concern for his family as a primary motivation further humanizes him. In other words, all these Widow Douglases and Mrs Watsons that want to civilize Huck aren’t very “civilized” people themselves, often showing extremely inhumane behavior and considerations towards blacks in the south.

Twain also shows the hypocrisy of religion. For example, at one pint Huck stays briefly with a family in a feud with another family, but who attend a sermon at church on brotherly love towards one’s neighbor. Another example is when Widow Douglas condemns Huck smoking his pipe, while Widow Douglas takes snuff, which is equally as bad, but which she excuses from the considerations of her religious morality. Huck notes this hypocrisy directly.

“That is just the way with some people. They get down on a thing when they don’t know nothing about it. Here she was a-bothering about Moses, which was no kin to her, and no use to anybody, being gone, you see, yet finding a power of fault with me for doing a thing that had some good in it. And she took snuff, too; of course that was all right, because she done it herself.”

Despite the sometimes weighty themes, Twain never loses sight of the humor that punctuates his story. The scenes with the two charlatans, the Duke and the King who Huck and Jim meet up with and join for a while are genuinely funny as they garble Shakespeare and scam various people out of their money in ridiculous ways. Indeed, Huck too often makes allusion to history and literature and the Bible, which is usually a garbled mess of different figures from different books or historical periods combined. The primary purpose is humor, but there also seems to be hints that this too is raising the question of how civilized are the people claiming to represent civilization. Often these famous names and events of the past and literature are remembered as a superficial mishmash. The humor is expressed especially strong in the end when Tom Sawyer tries to help Huck free Jim after he is retaken, but Tom’s plans to help are always ridiculous and impractical being based on books he has read about prison escape and insisting on doing it the right way, which seems to be Twain’s way of poking fun at these literary tropes found in these sorts of books. ...more

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Feb 20, 2018 Emma Stark rated it really liked it

I love the way that Tom Sawyer comes of as a Don Quixote figure and attempts to make all of his experiences excessively detailed. I also think that Twain does a good job showing that conscience and morality can clash with society's understanding of these issues and when that happens, it is best to follow your conscience. Huck Finn's moral struggle is so poignant and I am saddened that he never discovers that he is actually doing the right thing. He thinks that he is going to hell for his actions ...more

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