The adventures of Huckleberry Finn

General

After his adventures with Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn ends up living with Widow Douglas who although nice annoys Huck as she is very strict and religious.The novel begins with Huck being taken back by his abusive drunk father. Tired of his father and his drunk attacks Huck fakes his death and takes a raft down the Mississippi river. Looking for a hideout Huck stays at Jackson Island to hide out until news of his death dies out. At the island Huck finds Jim Mrs. Watson's slave. Jim and Huck decide to travel together and get Jim to the free states.On their way their Huck encounters various characters that cause him to mature and stop being the oblivious little boy that would pick on Jim. Though this is all destroyed at the end of the novel when Tom Sawyer returns and Huck regresses back to the dumb self-centered boy he was in the adventures of Tom Sawyer.

The major theme that I received was that of slavery and racism as through Huck's childhood innocence and influences of society show how Huck is made to believe certain racist ideologies are the correct ideologies. 

Mark Twain's tone in the book is very humorous and ironic.

 “...[Jim] would steal his children -- children that belonged to a man... a man that hadn’t ever done me no harm.”

"WELL, I got a good going-over in the morning from old Miss Watson on account of my clothes; but the widow she didn’t scold, but only cleaned off the grease and clay, and looked so sorry that I thought I would behave awhile if I could. Then Miss Watson she took me in the closet and prayed, but nothing come of it. She told me to pray every day, and whatever I asked for I would get it. But it warn’t so. I tried it. Once I got a fish-line, but no hooks. It warn’t any good to me without hooks. I tried for the hooks three or four times, but somehow I couldn’t make it work. By and by, one day, I asked Miss Watson to try for me, but she said I was a fool. She never told me why,and I couldn’t make it out no way."

"At first I hated the school, but by and by I got so I could stand it."

Irony: "WELL, I got a good going-over in the morning from old Miss Watson on account of my clothes; but the widow she didn’t scold, but only cleaned off the grease and clay, and looked so sorry that I thought I would behave awhile if I could. Then Miss Watson she took me in the closet and prayed, but nothing come of it. She told me to pray every day, and whatever I asked for I would get it. But it warn’t so. I tried it. Once I got a fish-line, but no hooks. It warn’t any good to me without hooks. I tried for the hooks three or four times, but somehow I couldn’t make it work. By and by, one day, I asked Miss Watson to try for me, but she said I was a fool. She never told me why,and I couldn’t make it out no way."

Imagery: “Miss Watson’s nigger, Jim, had a hair-ball as big as your fist, which had been took out of the fourth stomach of an ox, and he used to do magic with it.”

Satire: “...[Jim] would steal his children -- children that belonged to a man... a man that hadn’t ever done me no harm.”

Diction: “No, sir,’ I says, ‘I don’t want to spend it. I don’t want it at all — nor the six thousand, nuther. I want you to take it; I want to give it to you — the six thousand and all.”

Syntax: “No, sir,’ I says, ‘I don’t want to spend it. I don’t want it at all — nor the six thousand, nuther. I want you to take it; I want to give it to you — the six thousand and all.”

Symbolism: "I was power glad to get away from the feuds, and so was Jim to get away from the swamp. We said there warn't no home like a raft, after all. Other places do seem so cramped up and smothery, but a raft don't. You feel mighty free and easy and comfortable on a raft."

Hyperbole: "...he looked that grand and good and pious that you’d say he had walked right out of the ark, and maybe was old Leviticus himself."

Characterization

Direct Characterization:

“Her sister, Miss Watson, a tolerable slim old maid, with goggles on, had just come to live with her, and took a set at me now with a spelling-book.”

“They judged it was him, anyway; said this drownded man was just his size, and was ragged, and had uncommon long hair, which was all like pap; but they couldn’t make nothing out of the face, be- cause it had been in the water so long it warn’t much like a face at all.”

Indirect Characterization:

“She put me in them new clothes again, and I couldn’t do nothing but sweat and sweat, and feel all cramped up.”

“After supper she got out her book and learned me about Moses and the Bulrushers, and I was in a sweat to find out all about him; but by and by she let it out that Moses had been dead a considerable long time; so then I didn’t care no more about him, because I don’t take no stock in dead people.”

“IN this book a number of dialects are used, to wit: the Missouri negro dialect; the extremest form of the backwoods Southwestern dialect; the ordinary ‘Pike County’ dialect; and four modified varieties of this last. The shadings have not been done in a hap- hazard fashion, or by guesswork; but painstakingly, and with the trustworthy guidance and support of personal familiarity with these several forms of speech.I make this explanation for the reason that without it many readers would suppose that all these characters were trying to talk alike and not succeeding”

Huck is very dynamic as through his adventures he puts away much of his racism and becomes friends with Jim, although at the end he reverts back to the boy he was with Mrs. Douglas.

I felt like I met a story book character as Huck’s adventures were a little too tall for me, but I do feel that I understood Twain’s critiques to society very well.