Mark Twain wrote the book “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” about a boy named Huck, a young white 13-year-old who goes on an adventure down the Mississippi River with Jim, a slave who searches for freedom from people they want to forget and rules that need breaking. It was set in the 1830s-40s post-civil war when slavery was legal. The book was published in 1885 and the issue of racism and slavery ended some years before. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is a timeless classic because the ideas Mark Twain used represent and challenge what is happening or has happened in the world.
Twain states in the explanatory that he wrote the book in a dialect which gives the book a comfortable feel to it. The way Huck speaks throughout the book is very carefree and innocent. “then comes a H-WHACK! – bum! bum! bumble-umble-um-bum-bum- bum-bum – and the thunder would go rumbling and grumbling away and quit – and then RIP comes an- other flash and another sockdolager” (Twain 127). It is seen that Huck still has this childlike fascination over the smallest things.
The story still gives the viewpoint of this 13-year-old who is still learning a lot of things about the world which makes it even more depressing because Huck speaks as if there is nothing wrong but in reality, the world is miserable. “It was fifteen minutes before I could work myself up to go and humble myself to a nigger—but I done it, and I warn’t ever sorry for it afterwards, neither” (Twain 87).
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Even though Huck apologized to Jim, he only did it because society tells him to be virtuous but says that it is still okay to have slavery. This shows how many flaws the human race had at the time. No matter how positive the attitude of the narrator is, the truth will always be dominant. The reader will be given a unique experience as many other books do not give this opportunity.
Twain wrote Huck Finn to teach us that sometimes doing what society says is not always right. Huck shows that even the hypocrisy society gives will not affect his moral values to what is right in his eyes. “I hoped that they was going to say he could have one or two of the chains took off, because they was rotten heavy, or could have meat and greens with his bread and water” (Twain 286).
Huck here thinks that Jim should be treated better than society treats him and is willing to go against society to give Jim an enjoyable life. Since the book is set at the time of slavery and racism, it was normal for things like name calling and violence to be used on the blacks. But in the viewpoint of Huck, he realized that Jim deserves to be free like him because he is not any different from him. “And it was the niggers- I just expected it” (Twain 185).
Mary Jane cries for the family of blacks because they are going to be separated. The white people usually are shown dehumanizing blacks, but she is probably one of the few characters that sympathize with the blacks being mistreated. Twain demonstrates how badly the blacks were treated because of their race and tells that future readers should be accepting of others and judge people based on their personality and value.
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is a book that teaches us many moral lessons in life. It embodies life in the south while still having messages relevant to people today.
