欧宝娱乐

We catched fish, and talked, and we took a swim now and then to keep off sleepiness. It was kind of solemn, drifting down the big still river, laying on our backs looking up at the stars, and we didn鈥檛 ever feel like talking loud, and it warn鈥檛 often that we laughed, only a kind of low chuckle. We had mighty good weather, as a general thing, and nothing ever happened to us at all, that night, nor the next, nor the next.
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn ~~~ Mark Twain



Selected by Me 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: The more I read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn the more I believe this is my very favorite book. I grow to love it more with each repeated reading.



In 1876, Mark Twain began writing The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the sequel to his widely popular novel The Adventures of Tom Sawyer . After eight years of reworking ~~ and sometimes destroying ~~ the manuscript, the novel was published. Fans of its predecessor were surprised to find that Huck Finn was not the romantic depiction of southern boyhood that Tom Sawyer was. Instead, the novel was a realistic look at the hypocrisy and senselessness of southern society. Huck Finn tells the story of a young boy searching for freedom and identity in this backwards society.

It鈥檚 hard for many Americans to accept a simple truth ~~ American history is not always pretty. There are atrocities we don鈥檛 like to be reminded of. For over 135 years, Mark Twain鈥檚 The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn has held up that mirror and challenged us to examine our souls. When Huck Finn was first introduced in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, he was Tom鈥檚 untamed friend, the one who was always ready to play hooky and look for pirate treasure; the friend Tom could always trust to follow him without question. In his own story, Huck takes over as narrator with his distinctive voice, sharing with the reader not only his escapades since fleeing his abusive father, but also his growing philosophy about slavery and the changing country around him.

In many ways Huckleberry Finn is the story of Jim, the runaway slave who accompanies Huck on his adventures, as much as it is Huck鈥檚 story. A complicated character, Jim goes from silly to tragic, sometimes even within the same paragraph. He dreams of freedom, not just for himself but for his wife and children, sharing with Huck his desire to purchase each of them back ~~ and if he can鈥檛 buy them back, he鈥檒l steal them. To help emphasize the heartbreak of Jim鈥檚 plight, Huck witnesses a family split up by a slave auction. Those around Huck are upset by it too, and their inaction speaks volumes.



The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn has been one of the most banned books in America. From complaints about its use of foul language and stereotypes, to being a bad influence on children, this book has never escaped controversy. While re-reading it again this go around, I wondered who exactly did Twain picture as his audience. Sometimes it feels like a young boy鈥檚 adventure, others it reads as a dour tale for adults. Yes, Huck dresses up like a girl and gets in comic misadventures, but this is more a novel about slavery, beatings, child abuse, alcoholism and murder. Huck鈥檚 America, much like 45鈥檚 America, is not a friendly one.

Viewing the novel as merely a contemporary tale of 罢飞补颈苍鈥檚 time, it is masterful how he handles Jim for that reader. Twain begins by hitting all of the stereotypes Americans of that period would have expected, then he builds on the character until he emerges as a hero, sacrificing his freedom to carry an injured white boy to safety. It is a subtle and brilliant statement against racism and for equality.



Lastly, Huckleberry Finn is a book about transitions. These transitions can be seen in the intermediate setting between transitions in which the novel takes place, Huck鈥檚 disenchantment with society over the course of the novel, and Huck鈥檚 moral maturation.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is filled with all sorts of transitions for Huck. Throughout the entire novel, Huck is in a state of Limbo. He鈥檚 fourteen years old, an awkward stage after childhood and before adulthood ~~ in the throes of puberty, while he鈥檚 floating down the Mississippi River, the boundary between individual freedom and an immature civilization. Huck transitions from a boy being civilized in St. Petersburg, Missouri, to a young man completely disenchanted with society. Finally, he transitions from being indoctrinated by southern morality to accepting his own individual morals and heading off to free Jim. Huck is constantly changing over the course of the novel. He starts out as the immature Missouri boy playing jokes on slaves, but by the end he is an enlightened young man ready to head west to a better tomorrow. Huckleberry Finn is the future of America.



Update 2022: I just completed my annual reading. I love the character of Huck so much.

Update 2023: It's amazing all the little things I picked up with this read. Twain is so good.