Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain.

¶ … Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain. The Works Cited two sources in MLA format.

Reading The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

For all voracious readers who have an insatiable thirst for serious, entertaining, enthralling and mature reading, popular names like William Shakespeare, Charles Dickens and Mark Twain are not only familiar but also all-time favorites of many. After The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Mark Twain introduced another thought-provoking yet highly gripping sequel of the masterpiece titled The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, that is avidly taught in schools, remains on all library shelves and is a great and a fast-paced read to date. This analytical as well as an argumentative paper revolves around the following thesis statement:

The masterwork The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain is a humorous story addressing highly debatable issues and soon became an extremely controversial magnum opus. It is a scholarly piece of writing that paved way for a new form of American literature, dissolving the barrier between the spoken and the literary language.

From the very first page of Twain's masterpiece, the author's audacious attempt at introducing a new literary form in the American literature by skillfully blending both the everyday and scholarly language is evident. He introduces himself and this sequel in the following way while extensively and boldly using shocking writing form in literary work:

You don't know about me, without you have read a book by the name of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, but that ain't no matter. That book was made by Mr. Mark Twain, and he told the truth mainly. There was things, which he stretched, but mainly he told the truth. That is nothing." (Twain, Chapter I, p. 1)

Hence from the passage above it is apparent that Twain for the first time in Western literature tried to bring about a change so massive, which compelled critics from all corners vehemently oppose the novelist's style. The Concord Public Library while commenting on the writer's efforts stated that the book is "more suited to the slums than to intelligent, respectable people" (Zwick). This is because Twain used the accent as well as prudently made the word choice keeping in mind an illiterate, uncouth young child from the slums. However, with this plunge, the writer frees all the scholarly figures from the chains of unjustified censors, bringing in new writing styles rather than staying contented with the conventional standards (Zwick). Despite the fact that the book has been banned, there are innumerable individuals of all ages and classes that have read every page of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. (Zwick)

The masterwork of Mark Twain successfully and effectively addressed the society's need to instill character-building values. As Huck shares with the readers, "pretty soon, I wanted to smoke and asked the widow to let me. But she wouldn't. She said, it was a mean practice and wasn't clean, and I must try not to do it anymore" (Twain, p. 2). Hence, quite lightheartedly, the author manages to disseminate the message of character building and social values of the Americans but the young child's smoking habit in the later chapters brings forward the writer's real purpose that the moral and social weakening is at its peak today. "Well, I couldn't see no advantage in going where she was going, so I made up my mind I wouldn't try for it" (p. 3). These words have both touches of hilarity and originality as well as provide inkling to the readers regarding human psychology and perception and the intricacies that a child with a young mind and an innocent soul fails to understand. Twain highlights the sound reasoning ability of a child as sharp as Huckleberry, provided adults make an effort to assist a child in better comprehension of the way the world works. Moreover, all along, the book unfolds the fears that a child nurtures in sleepless solitude. However, Twain does that so subtly with all his creative genius at work and with lots of vivid imagination into play that penetrates the serious message into the reader's heart with the reader enjoying every bit of the wild descriptions of even the minute details. Focusing on crude and wild perceptions of a child, Twain further writes, expressing the viewpoint of Huck, "Then away out in the woods, I heard that kind of a sound that a ghost makes when it wants to tell about something that's on its mind and can't make itself understood" (p. 3).

However, the novelist's idea of addressing big as well as grave issues wrapped in sugarcoated words and phrases is certainly about being sensible and being adaptable to the norms of the society. However, there are various points in the book when the author makes blunt statements thereby uncovering the extreme injustices, gender biases, class differences, social barriers and racial discriminations. The book is an insightful journey and an entertaining as well as an eye-opener kind of a trip to the events and the lifestyle following the Civil War in antebellum America. The eminent American writer has discerningly showed his disapproval of the treatment of African-Americans and in an attempt to prove the meaninglessness and the shallowness of the human concept of classifying human beings and gauging their worth in terms of superficial standards of opulence, social status, color and creed. The remarkable writer through this book proves his ability to be not only a humorist but also a satirist. The cockeyed hilarious description of Shakespeare in chapter 21 of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the rat incident in the basement, the colorful and lively description of a naked man, ornate with the shades of the rainbow, exhibited as "The King's Camelopard; or, The Royal Nonesuch" constitute the funny side of this magnum opus. The full of pep and laughter episode pertaining to the execution of a pig at the hands of Huck also adds to the hilarity of the fictional piece of literature.