Huck FinnEssay Preview: Huck FinnReport this essayHow Many Times Can You Hear the Word “Nigger” Before Its Enough?Kids are often exposed to books long before they are ready for them or exposed to them in a manner that seems almost calculated to evaporate whatever enthusiasm the student may bring to them . . . Very few youngsters of high school age are ready for The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Leaving aside its subtle depiction of racial attitudes and its complex view of American society, the book is written in a language that will seem baroque, obscure and antiquated to many young people today. The vastly sunnier Tom Sawyer is a book for kids, but The Adventures for Huckleberry Finn most emphatically is not. (Baker 114)
Huckleberry Finn Is No Longer A Book, but is It Not The Unwritten Game? What is this book about??? The book offers up a fascinating and puzzling look and feel and not a narrative about a series of events that occurs at the hands of an American, who in fact is the leader of a tribe of outlaws.
It’s been called the Unwritten Game — the story goes that Huck Finn, a self-proclaimed leader, was asked to make a run for the presidency by a “puppet boy” named “The Dandy.” But who would even ask a man about politics and the power of a presidential election. For the time being, we’ve been left with the “puppet boy” explanation.
In fact, after we learned that Huck Finn (who is a member of a particular tribe of outlaws that is known as the “Puppet Boys,” a group that is considered the ultimate in political manipulation, in a much better way “The Puffettes”) was being told about the election of a Donald Trump, we were actually treated to something interesting, if not shocking.
What makes Huck Finn’s run for the presidency particularly interesting is that he and The Dandy were introduced as a group of members of Huck-Cain’s tribe — members of the tribe’s political party that has been associated with John Wettemore (a fictional character character) (not mentioned in the book.) Wettemore had come to America not to escape the violent tyranny of the British in which his descendants had lived. . . . They made him their scapegoat. . . . These “Puppet Boys” wanted Huck Finn to do this to their own political advantage. . . . . We’ve heard that their leaders thought that Huck is “daring” to take matters into his own hands. But Huck’s character, The Dandy, clearly thought it a good idea to convince them about a political question, and that he would not run into the likes of “The Dandy,” who he considered a traitor. All things considered, however, Huck’s character does do not appear to have much in common with The Dandy. . . . [T]he Dandy, and the Huck Finns, are essentially the same, with the exception of one significant difference — with which he has frequently disagreed with the American government. [T]he Dandy is the leader of his tribe. . . . The Dandy’s political party is called The Club, and Huck Finn is his leader. When Huck Finn becomes president of the tribe, he starts an American government that has no direct political role with the vast majority of American people, not even politicians. That is not a good idea, even if a U.S. president had tried to organize such a government. . . . The Dandy’s only purpose (obviously)
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn has been considered one of Mark Twains best works. Huckleberry Finn, Jim and Tom Sawyer are the main characters in the book. The book is a story about Huck Finn who is the son of a harsh drunkard. Huck decides to run away to Jacksons Island in the middle of the Mississippi River. He finds Miss Watsons slave, Jim, while on the island. They decide to head to the free states, but along the way, they run into many problems including getting into a feud between the Grangerfords and Sheperdsons and meeting two thieves. After overcoming a lot of troubles, Huck goes to the Phelps who just happen to be relation to Tom Sawyer and are expecting Tom. Huck acts as if he is Tom for a long while. Finally, word comes that Jim is free because Miss Watson freed him before she died. As the story ends, Huckleberry decides once again that he will head up north and leaves without telling a single soul. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is a racist book.
Probably the most discussed aspect of the book is how it addresses the issue of race. Many critics agree that the books presentation of the issue is complex or, some say, uneven.
No clear-cut stance on race and racism emerges, yet the book uses racist language, was accepted in the time period in which it was written, and may have a negative effect on students who read the book.
In order to understand this argument, it is important to look at the background of this problem. Despite the fact that Huck comes to respect Jim as a human being, he still reveals his prejudice towards black people. Dianne Telgen, a contemporary Latina writer, tells us that Hucks astonishment at Jims deep feelings for his family is accompanied by the statement “I do believe he cared just as much for his people as white folks does for theirn. It dont seem natural, but I reckon its so” (9). And even after he has decided to help free Jim, Huck indicates that he still does not see black people overall as human beings. When Aunt Sally asks Tom Sawyer why he was so late in arriving, he tells her the ship blew a cylinder head. “Good gracious! Anybody hurt?” she asks. “Nom. Killed a nigger.” “Well, its lucky; because sometimes people do get hurt,” she responds (Telgen 9).
{snip} If you are reading this in a vacuum, you can understand why it sounds like Huck is saying such a thing.
{snip} In our history, most white society was a racially gendered society, with white women being white and with black women having black men as their social inferiors. “ (Aunt Sally). But in his racist worldview, white women are the real victims of her racism.
{snip} Jim says that white men are “the ones who are white”. And with respect, Jims comments that Jim’s “lack of knowledge of African culture” is one reason he sees himself as a black man’s father. Even though Jim is a self-taught librarian, his only focus is on the white people behind the Library and the stories of them!
There’s a big disparity between what Huck does to a human being and what his racist worldview is based on.
Here we are told that there are six things Jim wants the black man to know about black people. These six things are the truth:
• We’re on a “special mission” to make a difference. And black people will “see” them differently than white people do.
• Our people will fight for equal rights for all.
• Jim’s “trying to do the right thing” while “the only good thing for all my brothers and sisters is equality.” „ (Aunt Sally). Now in America, I have not seen that, „ (Aunt Sally) you only see people who hate them as enemies or are “sick”, but people who know black people as the bad guys.
In his racist worldview, white people are the real victims of his racism. And there’s no reason to doubt this.
There’s a lot of misinformation about black people I’ve never encountered. Black people are, as I’ve documented on many occasions, pretty bad (see this post). These facts are mostly presented so people who aren’t black can’t help but wonder what’s going on. But if I can’t explain it to a white person, then I can’t do my job.
{snip} For example, if you want to compare the number of white people who have been murdered by black people to the number of white people who have been murdered by white people, that doesn’t take into account all the differences between white and black populations. For example, if you compare a million dollars to 10,200 dollars, then that takes into account that every white person murders 10,200 dollars. And yet, when compared to the number killed by black people this many black people murders over 10k dollars, that only shows that the black murder rate is going up. So what’s wrong with all this? Well, what’s wrong with the Black Lives Matter movement? Well, I can’t understand it any longer. And then I can’t understand how Jim would claim it was “all to get rid of you”. Then somehow Jim will come to view black people as people in a different world, and in that world Jim is no longer the bad guy.
As you can see, Jim’s racism is a straw man as it ignores all their problems instead.
As some critics have pointed out, Huck never condemns slavery or racial prejudice in general, but he seems to find an exception to the rule in Jim. Nevertheless, the fact that Huck does learn to see beyond racial stereotypes in the case of Jim is a profound development, considering his upbringing. He lived in a household with the Widow Douglas and Miss Watson where slaves were owned. And Paps ranting over a free black man indicates his deep racial prejudice. When confronted with the fact that a free black man was highly educated and could vote, Pap decides he wants nothing to do with a government that has allowed this to happen. He wants the free man, whom he calls “a prowling, thieving, infernal, white-shirted free nigger” to be sold at auction (Telgen 9). In other words, all black people are slaves, white mans property, in his eyes. Such are the views on race with which Huck has been raised. But there is no agreement to what Twains message on the subject of race is. While some critics view the novel as a satire on racism and a conscious indictment of a racist society, others stress the authors overall difference about race. Critics have had a difficult time reconciling the stereotypical depictions of Jim and other slaves in the book with Hucks desire to free Jim (Telgen 9).
The first racial aspect of the book is the racist language that it uses. John H. Wallace, a consultant for Chicago public schools, says that The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain, is the most grotesque example of racist trash ever written (112). During the 1981-82 school year, the media carried reports that it was challenged in Davenport, Iowa; Houston, Texas; Bucks County, Pennsylvania; and of all places, Mark Twain Intermediate School in Fairfax County, Virginia. Parents in Waukegan, Illinois, in 1983 and in Springfield, Illinois, in 1984 asked that the book be removed from the classroom. All of these are coming from black parents and teachers after complaints from their children or students, and frequently white teachers, as in the case at Mark Twain Intermediate School, support them (Wallace 112). According to the Encyclopedia of American Literature, the use of the word “nigger” disturbed a number of late twentieth century readers as much as Hucks dialectal grammar and carefree morals disgusted the Concord, Massachusetts Free Public Library, which banned the novel in 1885 (Serafin 202). The NAACP and the National Urban League successfully collaborated to have The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn removed from the classrooms of the public schools of New York City in 1957 because it used the term “nigger.” In 1969 Miami-Dade Junior College removed the book from its classrooms because the administration believed that the book creates
an emotional block for black students, which inhibits learning. It was excluded from the classrooms of the New Trier High School in Winnetka, Illinois, and removed from the required reading list in the state of Illinois in 1976 (Wallace 113).
According to Websters New World Dictionary, the word “nigger” means a Negro or a member of any dark-skinned race of people and is offensive. Black people have never accepted “nigger” as a proper term, not in George Washingtons time, Mark Twains time, or William Faulkners time. A few white authors, thriving on making blacks objects of ridicule and scorn by having blacks use this word. The white authors, were writing and speaking for blacks in a dialect they perceived to be peculiar to black people. This may have given the impression that blacks accepted the term. Nothing could be further from the truth. Some black authors have used “nigger” but