Criticism of Huckleberry Finn by Leo Marx

Leo Marx Critic on Huckleberry Finn

The objective of this paper is to provide summary and analysis of the novel titled "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" (Twain, 1998 p 1). The author's story contains problematic questions of freedoms, race, and identity. Twain's opening sentence notifies the readers about Huck Finn's personality describing him as a narrator who has an ability to narrate the story in his dialect and language, however, full of misspellings and grammatical errors. Overview of Huck's spoken language reveals that he sounds uneducated, young who come from Missouri. The first chapter introduces Huck's deadpan personality. Since Huck is a young, uneducated, and uncivilized, he uses a direct manner to describe events without using an extensive commentary. The theme of the novel explores the nation identity and race revealing Huck struggle with challenges of the strenuous journey because of the 19th-century social climate. Typically, Huck personality is in moral conflict with society, which he lives. In essence, the theme of the novel is related to the African-American culture because Finn character illustrates African-Americans voice as a whole showing a correlation between the black and white cultures in the United States.

2. Thesis Statement

The Twain masterpiece work of "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" is a classic American literature that departs itself from European literary model. The unique aspect of the novel was that the author used vernacular speech, frontier humor as well as uneducated young narrator to reveal and portray a general life in America. The theme of the book portrayed a deformed conscience that is in contact with conscience and collision that revealed Huck's moral development as continue encountering an array of haphazard situations and people. Another dominant theme in the book is about Jim's and Huck Journey that has been widely reflecting corruption in the society that encourages deception and greed.

"The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" (Twain, 1998 p 1) is a classic book that is widely read and praised. After the World War 1, the book became a required read book in most high schools and middle schools because it reveals many aspects of American history that includes existence virulent racial prejudice, and slavery in a country dedicated to equality and prejudice. Overview of the novel reveals that all modern American literature originate from Huckleberry Finn because it is the first major novel that narrator speaks dialect. Unlike the early literature where narrators speak a polished and refined language, the Twain's novel is about the Huck's autobiography revealing how Twain shows that moral authority can originate from a poor white when a juvenile delinquent is new in American culture. However, the book has been subjected to a bitter criticism between 1884 and 1885. In the late 19th century, many people considered the book as irreverent, unrefined, coarse, and vulgar. In the 20th century, some people condemned the book based on its frequent racial expletives because Huckleberry Finn novel offers complex portrayals of gender and race.

The real goal of the book is to describe a subversive confrontation of slavery and racism in the United States. The novel provides an adequate representation of the experience of African-American during the time of slavery leading to the ethical condemnation of racism. (Timothy, 2014). The racism is particularly revealed in the book because Finn is particularly referred as 'nigger' in the book. However, a word "nigger" is an abusive way of addressing the American Americans during the time. Typically, the "nigger" commonly used for the black characters in connoting a rough language of addressing Jim.

The novel introduces Jim as the Huck's future friend and companion. The book also reveals that most slaves in Missouri are domestic servants, thus, Jim's behaviors as being interpreted by Huck are the stereotype of laziness as being attributed to black. The author also introduces Tom Sawyer who is a contrasting character to Huck despite their obvious friendly and bond. While Tom Sawyer has a playful humor character, however, Huck is possessed with bitter satire. His tendency is to be romantic, exaggerate and control the situations.

3. Analytical Evidence Claim from the Novel

An analytical interpretation of a book starts with the title. A major reason that makes Twain name the title character Huckleberry is that the word was insignificant to people in the 19th century. However, Twain referred Huck Finn as an outcast in the society because he was able to identify flaws in the society when other people could not. The structure of the novel is episodic showing the critique of racial prejudice and slavery. The overarching theme of the novel is how Huck has been able to internalize his racial prejudice by using "nigger" 150 times in the novel revealing the offensive and derogatory language of 1884. Thus, the book underscores the level and extent a collective and individual morality can be contradictory in the society. In essence, Huckleberry Finn provides a sordid underside of America life filling with illiteracy, greed, brutality, and bigotry. The novel also provides a great deal about the effect of the civil war on Americans, however, the tone of the novel make people pose a question whether Huckleberry Finn is a racist because Twain parents own and lease slaves making Twain abhor racial prejudice when he wrote the Huckleberry Finn.

When the book as first published in 1885 in the United States, some libraries banned the book because it was perceived offensive to propriety. However, the issue did not affect the book's popularity because it was the best-selling book of Twain' work. After the First World War, the Twain's work gradually elevated into the national treasury. Despite its popularity, the book has been criticized of its stereotype because it exposes bigotry and hypocrisy of southern separatism. In 1950, Leo Marx and Bernard DeVoto raised objections to the book's ending, however, in 1985; the American literary environment provided the critical appraisals, bibliographies, and a new edition of the book. However, some people continue challenging the reputation of the novel with reference to a classic American literature. The criticism of the book took a new dimension in 1990 because some scholars consider the novel as a cultural product. However, Jocelyn Chadwick and Shelley Fisher consider the importance of confluence of Black and white culture in the book. Several publishers such as Mark Twain Foundation has encouraged scholars to provide a further scholarship of the book. Despite this criticism, the interests in the Huckleberry Finn continue to increase.