The Adventure

’S Of Huck And Jim: A Boy’S Rebellion, A Slave’S Freedom Essay, Research Paper

In The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Twain develops the plot into Huck and Jim’s adventures allowing him to weave in his criticism of society. The two main characters, Huck and Jim, both run from social injustice and both are distrustful of the civilization around them. Huck is considered an uneducated backward boy, constantly under pressure to conform to the “humanized” surroundings of society. Jim a slave is not even considered as a real person, but as property. As they run from civilization and are on the river, they ponder the social injustices forced upon them when they are on land.

These social injustices are even more evident when Huck and Jim have to make landfall, and this provides the author with the chance to satirize the socially correct injustices that Huck and Jim encounter on land. The satire that Twain uses to expose the hypocrisy, racism, greed and injustice of society develops along with the adventures that Huck and Jim have. The ugly reflection of society we see should make us question the world we live in, and only the journey down the river provides us with that chance. Throughout the adventure, Huck sees the hypocrisy of society.

Huck’s recognition of these hypocrisies and absurdities of the society represented by the Widow and Miss Watson, and his preference for nature and his own natural impulses, bring out the novel’s notion of how society tends to corrupt true morality, freedom, and justice, which exist in nature, and how the individual must follow his or her own conscience.

The first character we come across with that trait is Miss Watson and the Widow Douglas. Miss Watson constantly corrects Huck for his unacceptable behavior, but Huck doesn’t understand why, “That is just the way with some people. They get down on a thing when they don’t know nothing about it”(15). The widow Douglas adopted and tried to “civilize” Huck. The two sisters’, one redeeming quality is their concern for Huck, which, though it possesses moralistic overtones, includes an element of sincerity, giving them some patience in dealing with the “uncivilized” Huck. Other than this, the sisters’ role is to represent the artificial, empty civilization to which Huck rejects. As much as the widow Douglass tries to adopt conventional religion upon Huck, he continues to reject it. Before every meal the widow told Huck he had to say grace. Huck referred to this as having to “grumble” over the food before they could eat it (14).

She tried to teach him about Moses, until Huck found out Moses was dead and lost interest. The comments made by Huck clearly show both women as hypocrites, scolding Huck for wanting to smoke and then using snuff herself and firmly believing that she would be in heaven:

Here she was bothering me about Moses, which was no kin to her, and no use to anybody, being gone, yet finding fault with me for doing a thing that had some good in it. And she took snuff too; of course that was all right, she done it herself (15).

Huck shows his anger and dislike for the values that were constantly placed on him by the Widow Douglas and her sister, Miss Watson. They both try to socialize Huck into a good boy. Huck was going stir-crazy, made especially restless by the sisters’ constant reminders to improve his behavior. When Miss Watson told him about the “bad place,” he burst out that he would like to go there, as a change of scenery.

Secretly, Huck really does not see the point in going to “the good place” and resolved then not to bother trying to get there. When Huck asked, Miss Watson told him there was no chance Tom Sawyer would end up in Heaven. Huck was glad “because I wanted him and me to be together”(16). Huck ran away but he went back when Tom Sawyer told him he could join his new band of robbers if he would return to the Widow “and be respectable.” The Widow Douglas and her sister Miss Watson, are the representatives of the society Huck rejects. They both immerse themselves in the values of “civilization,”

This is not just a boy running away from home. It is someone who has decided to turn his back on everything “home” stands for, even one of its most cherished beliefs. Huck’s adventure began because he was rebelling; he pushed aside all those values that everyone else wanted him to have. Huck’s views are all completely naturalistic; free of any of the pretensions toward refinement that marks the Widow Douglas and her sister Miss Watson. Huckleberry is rough, rustic–a truly “uncivilized” boy. He rebels against the restraints of “civilization” artificial, middle-class society and its delusions, represented by “cramped” clothing and religion, respectively. Huck’s complete sincerity, which leads to his dislike for hypocritical “civilization,” is his defining quality.

He was running away from what everyone else believed. He in a way refused not to conform and be bound by the limitations of American Civilization. He was running to freedom of the river. The river never cares how saintly you are, how rich you are, or what society thinks you are. The river allows Huck the one thing that Huck wants to be, and that is Huck. The river constitutes freedom from the land of oppression, and that oppression is no more evident than it is to Jim.

It is somewhat surprising that Huck’s traveling companion is Jim. In this i