Huckleberry Finn
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain is a coming-of-age novel about an adolescent boy named Huckleberry Finn. In the novel Huckleberry learns many of life's lessons, helping him grow and mature. In the beginning of the novel, Huck fakes his own death in order to escape his abusive and alcoholic father. Pap, as Huck calls him, had kidnapped Huck from his caretaker the Widow Douglas, who tried to "sivilize" him. Through his elaborately staged death, Huck floats down the Mississippi River on an abandoned canoe he found near the shore. Stopping on Jackson Island, he comes across a runaway slave named Jim. Jim, like Huckleberry had escaped for his own freedom. Huck wanted freedom from society, and Jim wanted freedom from his owner Miss Watson. Throughout the novel, Huck Finn becomes more self-reliant and mature, he begins to understand the evil in slavery, and he realizes that he must follow his own conscience. From the very beginning of the novel, Huck without a doubt stated that he did not want to conform to society, "The Widow Douglas took me for her son, and allowed she would sivilize me. I got into my old rags and my sugar hogshead again, and was free and s
become conventional. "'Don't put your feet up there, Huckleberry'; and 'Don't scrunch up like that, Huckleberry-set up straight'; and pretty soon she would say, 'Don't gap and stretch like that, Huckleberry-why don't you try to behave?'" (Twain 2). This quote gives the reader the feeling that Huck tries to do things he knows will annoy Miss Watson. He seems to want to live a life free of complications, and be an independent person. (Mizener 42). But Huck doesn't have that liberty, instead he has to face his father's abuse, and figure out a way to escape it. In staging his own death and floating down the Mississippi-- ready to live a life of his own-- Huck takes his first step in self-reliance and maturity. Huck grows and develops more and more throughout the novel, particularly through his experiences with the Grangerfords and Shepardsons, and at the end of the novel when he decides not to turn Jim in to Miss Watson. During a storm on the river, Huck and Jim get separated and Huck swims to shore for safety. He seeks shelter and stumbles upon the Grangerfords home. They welcome him in and give him food, clothing, and a place to sleep. While staying with them, Huck learns about a feud between their family and another, the Shepardsons. After witnessing a gunfight between the two families he says, "It made me so sick I most fell out of the tree...I wished I hadn't ever come ashore that night to see such things" (Twain 115). After witnessing the fight, Huck leaves the Grangerfords and goes back to the river. Huck and Jim then spend much time on the river with the Duke and Dauphin, con artists they had picked up on shore. One night Huck gets to thinking about how he is helping Jim, and he says, "I was stealing a poor old woman's nigger that h
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Approximate Word count = 1188
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)
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