I read "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" in high school, four years ago. I was surprised but pleased to discover that I really enjoyed the novel and actually read the whole thing, unlike so many of my classmates. After learning that I would be revisiting the novel for this class, I had hoped that I would remember most of the story. After all, I could rattle off the major plot points and give brief biographies for most of the characters, and even wax eloquently about some of Twain's underlying agenda.
Sadly for me, rereading the novel proved that not only had I forgotten much of the book, but even the first time around I had missed a huge amount of Mark Twain's points. Huck Finn has far more depth than a simple story and really is a scathing description of a society and culture. I picked up on more this read but discovered, much to the chagrin of every English teacher I've encountered in my life, I didn't much care for that aspect.
More than anything else, I think, Twain was a good story teller. It was the characters I fell in love with the first time I read the story and it was the characters that welcomed me back.
Jim greated me with a simple and characteristic, "Who dah?" For a while, it wasn't the Jim that I remembered and I questioned my memory of the character. Where was the man so kind-hearted and honest, ready to do the right thing and so capable of both befriending and mentoring Huck? This simpleton with a hairball, convinced that witches would fly him all over the state wasn't the Jim I knew. No, that Jim came later, slowly growing out of the pages and into a wonderful reality of a man. It was the Jim who refused to leave Tom Sawyer bleeding in the woods that I remembered. He was still there and I discovered that I still admired the man. He was uneducated and forever convinced that his hairy chest meant he would be rich one day, but that doesn't mean he wasn't the character with the purest of hearts.
Then there was Tom Sawyer, the rapscallion with such a large imagination and a propensity for getting himself in trouble. I had forgotten how much of a distaste I had for Tom in this book. After finishing Huckleberry Finn, I enjoyed it enough to venture into other Twain works and read The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, a book where I discovered Tom in a different light. In that novel, I liked him, but the Tom in Huckleberry's story was different. Continually, I found myself frustrated by the boy's total and utter lack of sense. He couldn't comprehend a serious situation and I was especially bothered by Tom when he concocted such an absurd scenario to free Jim.
Often in stark contrast to Tom was Huck, but I was surprised to find that I didn't like Huck all the way through the novel as I thought I would. I began the book with a sort of ambivalence towards the rough and tumble boy, no longer as intranced by his rebellious nature as I was years before. In essence, he moved with the river. He hardly ever took action but allowed himself to pushed along by random happenstance and the actions of others. The change began when the Duke and the King got involved with the deceased Peter Wilk's fortune and Huck realized that he couldn't let these two con men get away with their scheme. As soon as Huck started to let his morality direct his actions, I began to like him more, but I wasn't fully set in my opinion. It was only after Jim had been turned in as a runaway slave that I think Huck really began to take action. He could have moved on like he did so many times before. In fact, he was tempted to just that, tempted to write a note to Miss Watson so that he could justify forgetting all about the man who had cared for him, befriended him, and mentored him. But he didn't.
Huck found himself, as he said, "betwixt two thing": he could make a firm decision and act on it or he could return again to the river to float on into infinity. And with a "All right, then, I'll go to hell," he chose. And he chose to act.
I was proud of Huck in that moment. Not so much that he could see past Jim's race to care for him but simply that he had grown to where he could make a decision on his own, knowing full well the consequences. Sadly, this independance was short lived.
Suddenly, Tom was back on the scene and Huck reverted to following the direction he was given by others. Anyone could see that Tom's plans where ridiculous just as easily as Huck could see that and yet he let Tom take the lead. There were moments of resistance, but never substantially and I was frustrated. I wanted Huck to remember that moment of strength he had on the riverbank, with the torn up letter in his hands, and the determination took to decide to free Jim. That Huck, who I saw but briefly, would have rejected Tom's plan for the absurdity it was. Where had that Huck gone?
The book ends nicely and everything worked out well, but I was saddened to think that maybe Huck hadn't truly come of age. He was back to fighting off those who wanted to "sivilize" him, just like he began. Where was the progress? What had happened to the growth Huck made when he decided to free Jim? I was disappointed.
I didn't feel this way after finishing the book the first time. Then, I was delighted at the journey Twain had taken me on and that everyone could go home happy. This time, everyone went home happy except for me.
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