Huck Finn 8217 S Experiences Term paper
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Huck Finn’s Experiences
In Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Twain presents the problem of slavery in America in the 19th Century. Twain poses this problem in the form of a character named Huckleberry Finn, a white boy raised in the antebellum South. Huck starts to question his view regarding slavery when he acquaints himself more intimately with a runaway slave while he himself tries to run away. Huck’s development as a character is affected by society’s influence on his experiences while growing up in the South, running away with Jim, and trying to save Jim. Although Huck decides to free Jim, Huck’s deformed conscience convinces him that he is doing the wrong thing.
Huck’s experiences in the society impact his conscience by raising him to believe that human beings can be property. This quote by Pap Finn is taken from a conversation that he is having about a black professor from the North, “…prowling, thieving, infernal, white-shirted free nigger, and-” (Twain, pg 27). In this quote, Pap Finn expresses his feelings towards black people, and he is not the only person to think this way. Pap feels as if the most accomplished black man is always beneath the basest white man. When Huck returns to Aunt Sally, they have this conversation:
Aunt Sally: “Good Gracious! anybody hurt?”
Huck: “No’m. Killed a nigger”
Aunt Sally: “Well, it’s lucky; because sometimes people do get hurt…”
(Twain, pg 221)
Southern society seems to share this idea of how white people belittle blacks. Aunt Sally shows how it does not really matter about a ‘nigger’ being shot and how she does not consider that a person getting hurt. Society’s influence on Huck is clearly evident when he says, “They took my nigger, which is the only nigger I’ve got in the world, and now I’m in a strange country, and aint not no property no more… I wouldn’t sake my nigger, would I? - the only nigger I had in the world, and the only property” (Twain, pg 216). The frequent use of the word “property” shows how society has corrupted his views of blacks. He clearly view them as property and not people with rights of their own.
Huck’s views regarding black people come into question when Huck and Jim run away together. Their experiences together let them become closer to each other and let Huck recognize Jim as a human being with real feelings. Huck starts to view Jim as a caring individual when they are on the raft. This is a scene taken from when Jim and Huck were working together on the raft and Jim was trying to protect them both from the rain, “Jim took up some of the top planks of the raft and built a snug wigwam to get under in blazing weather and rainy, and to keep the things dry. Jim made a floor for the wigwam, and raised it a foot or more above the level of the raft, so now the blankets and all the traps was out of reach of steamboat waves” (Twain, pg 64). In this part of the novel, Huck seems to be all Jim has, and Jim is also all Huck seems to have, and they work together to build a place that the waves cannot reach them. Their feeling of friendship is born through working together and protecting each other. Even though Huck and Jim are having new experiences together, Huck’s conscience is still going back and forth about the idea of freeing a slave. This quote is taken from when Huck wants to keep his promise to Jim and not break his promise, “Well, I did. I said I wouldn’t, and I’ll stick to it. Honest injun, I will. People would call me a low-down Abolitionist and despise me for keeping mum-but that don’t make no difference. I ain’t a-going to tell…” (Twain, pg 43). This quote that is said by Huck shows that Huck’s feelings and beliefs about slavery have not changed dramatically and yet he still feels that he is doing the wrong thing, yet he will not say anything to keep his word. This also shows what are the things that are most important to him at this moment in the novel. While on the raft, Jim says this to Huck “Dah you goes, de ole true Huck; de on’y white genlman dat ever kep’ his promise to ole Jim” (Twain, pg 89). This is when Huck keeps thinking about whether or not he should turn Jim in. The way that he was brought up...
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