Mark Twain published The Adventures of Huck Finn 119 years ago today on February 18, 1885. Many regard Huck Finn as THE classic American novel. Many literary scholars could go on with greater erudition than I on the unique voice Twain achieved and the nuance of his depiction of American society.
The book unfortunately now gets some nonsense protests over his use of the N word. This is just damned SILLY of course, as Twain has given us the most genteel way possible to get up next to our historical problems. We should be thanking him for helping break it down.
The centerpiece moment of the book doesn't ultimately have anything to do with race, though, but rather concerns what might be called independence of conscience. By his raising, Huck Finn was thoroughly convinced that it was his moral obligation before God himself to turn in Jim the runaway slave. He didn't want to do it, as Jim had been his one true friend and protector.
Ultimately, Huck makes a conscious decision to be condemned to hell for his disobedience rather than turn in his friend. That rates with me as one of the more thrilling moments of all literature.
As Tom Petty wrote a century later,
You can stand me up at the gates of hell, but I won't back down.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Alan Dale
I agree with everything you say. Thanks for saying it. Another point: since the book is written in the first person, Twain himself never uses the racial epithet at all. That's Huck speaking or quoting other people using it.
2 - Shark
Al,
Just want to mention something really important;
There's a relatively new edition of Huck published by Univ. of Cal. Press; it's the definitive version and includes a couple of chapters left out of the original MS. (they were found in an attic in LA in 1990!)
This book contains ton of notes, maps, and additional ref. materials. It's the 'bible' version of Huck Finn, and should be added to your books above as a service to the public.
ISBN: 0520228065
Man, I can't rave enough about this book; if you haven't read it, you haven't read Huck.
re: Twain's usage of "nigger"
Sad to say, this is the most banned book in America. If anyone thinks it's 'racist', they just don't friggin' get it. Jim is the most honorable character in the book.
re: Moral clarity/integrity/ambiguity - There's a great Twain short story called "Was it Heaven or Hell?" that illustrates the same dilemma: Do you "lie" ie sin, in order to save someone from incredible pain, or do you tell the truth and cause hurt?
3 - Dirtgrain
I don't think that the book should be banned. However, I do want to point out a contradiction in our society. In many school districts, books that contain excessive vulgar language are banned (or unofficially banned because they are never ordered). The Livonia School District in Michigan banned a young-adult fiction book, Fallen Angels, by Walter Dean Myers. It had the word, "fuck," in it too many times. The same district teaches The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, which has the word, "nigger," in it over 200 times. What is worse, the word, "fuck," or the word, "nigger?" It depends on whom you ask.
We shouldn't ban books because of their language. Sticks and stones. . . Rather, we should determine which books we teach based on their quality and on their value in addressing some aspect of the human condition. As for age-appropriateness, I don't really care. I learned the word, "fuck," when I was in first grade. I didn't know what it meant, but I knew the word and probably used it on a few occasions. I don't think this knowledge harmed me at all.
4 - Mark Saleski
good gawd, i just realized i've never read Huck Finn.
5 - Al Barger
Yo Shark- thanks for the tip. Note that it is now included. Perhaps I will see if our library has the library edition. I haven't read it in a long while myself.
6 - Shark
Thanks, Al.
NOTE: There's a softcover version for about $15.
7 - CW Fisher
Shark wrote: "There's a relatively new edition of Huck published by Univ. of Cal. Press; it's the definitive version and includes a couple of chapters left out of the original MS. (they were found in an attic in LA in 1990!)"
In my town are two churches: one with iron bells and one with digital bells. The way to tell the difference is to wait for the end, because the digital bells click off without decay. It's jarring. Makes you feel foolish.
That's how I feel about new chapters found in attics. Especially in LA. That cheesy town? Find me an "attic" in L.A.
They don't exist. Cue sax.
I get bad email from people claiming the attached was written by George Carlin, stuff you read and say, wow, so true. But not funny! That's a clue.
If Twain took it out and somebody else put it back in, that's a sad state of affairs. If it's a forgery it would be easy to tell since he left a fabulous paper trail of almost everything he ever wrote. It wouldn't surprise me if he excised a chapter. It wouldn't surprise me if Bernard De Voto already excerpted it.
What would surprise me is an attic in L.A.
Thanks, Al for bringing me back. I've been to Hannibal many times doing research. There's a nice central place for BC to meet someday.
8 - Shark
CW,
That's how I feel about towns with two churches that ring bells.
I'm from Missouri; show me.
9 - Shark
Just to clarify:
the 'attic' find was an original manuscript for the first half of the story. (now labeled M1)
Scholars had the hand-written, second half of the story (M2). The LA find reunited the entire original MS.
It's interesting only to scholars and Twain fanatics like myself because one can see the changes made--- especially as Huck's 'voice' evolved over the six odd years Clemens took to write it. The M1/M2 were revised again before being typeset, so a comparison between the finished product and the original MS is fascinating.
Yeah, I know: I have a lot of time on my hands, but somebodie's gotta do it.
10 - Danielle Johnson
In the novel written by Mark Twain, ‘The Adventures Of Huckleberry Finn’ , I believe that Mark Twain’s use of the word “Nigger” is truly and completely degrading and destructive. There is no doubt that Twain created a controversial issue in our society today. School boards and libraries are looking to ban ‘Huckleberry Finn’ for its racist content, and I as a reader agree with their decision to ban the novel. Twain’s novel creates stereotypes and is offensive to black readers. Wanting to ban the book began when it was first published in 1885, 119 years ago. Much has changes since then and the way our society treats racism.
Our society today treats racism more intense than in 1885, when it was normal to say “Nigger” and have black slaves. Now that our society doesn’t have slaves, to read something like
“Good gracious! Anybody hurt?” (Aunt Sally)
”No’m. Killed a nigger”(Huck Finn)
“Well, it’s lucky; because sometimes people do get hurt.” (Page 249),
its very shocking. My point is that in 1885 Twains racist comments were the norm, but not today in our society, where it is not healthy to be stereotyped and ridiculed because of your skin color. I think it is time for the novel to go into “retirement”.
11 - Al Barger
Miss Danielle, thank you for visiting and contributing to Blogcritics discussion.
However, you could not possibly be more utterly, totally wrong about Huck Finn in every possible way. For starters, why would you presume that someone choosing to be officially offended by the book would be a reason for others not to read it? By what right? You personally, of course, are welcome not to read it. That's strictly your business.
However, Huck Finn is probably by far THE most cited candidate for greatest American novel EVER, for more than a century. That so completely trumps petty concerns about the word "nigger."
Indeed, the word NIGGER is absolutely an artistic necessity here. Twain was confronting US artistically, slapping us up side the head with the complete stupid, wicked and simply incorrect attitudes of our society. Nicey-nice language would be whitewashing the scene. Also, to point out the obvious, the people talking about "niggers" were clearly portrayed as wrong and hateful, and Nigger Jim was absolutely the hero of the damned book.
Perhaps instead, you could better devote your energies to stamping out gangster rap records, which use the word far more liberally than Twain- but also UNlike Twain are using it to belittle and dehumanize black folk.
Plus, I assume you'll be burning all the Richard Pryor records, of course.
12 - TUrbano
Mark Twain, who wrote Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, has definitely given me a ride with emotions toward the book. In the very beginning I noticed that everyone refers to African-American people as the "n-word". I was immediately turned off and didn't really want to continue. However, I later realized that during that time period, that's how African-Americans were referred to as. I had to accept it because that's how it was back then. Another thing was that all foreigners were considered colored and there isn't anything you can really do to change the past. It's a done deal, but the only thing you can do is learn from it. Although I never got over it even in the later chapters, it is something that you just have to look over, for that sake of the significance of the novel.
Another thing that I noticed throughout the novel was the stereotypes that were used. Twain targeted mostly black men and women who were slaves or free, and made them sound very dumb, uneducated, and inferior. That was something that bothered me for I am a foreigner. It was something that I couldn't get over because stereotypes are wrong, unethical and don't prove anything. Some people are educated, some are not. It doesn't pertain to just a single race. There can be good and bad people of every race, of every religion, and of every nationality. So in essence, I really think there were many controversial topics. I liked the book and it has really helped me to be more open-mined, something more people need to become.
13 - Joshua Shafer
I think that the contents in Twain's novel are okay. Sure the use of language that is conidered racist nowadays is used in it,but I think that's what makes the book what it is and why it is such a great piece of literature. I think Twain did a great job with pushing our ammendment of freedom of speech to its limits. If this book is banned then what good is our freedom of speech.
The use of the word nigger and the moral issues of freeing slaves defined Huck's character. This was needed in order make the last chapters as powerful as they were. I admire twain for writing this piece because it's in your face. I think that's how we should nowadays and stop sugar-coating things. I know that the language may seem disrespectful but that's how it was back then and I think that we should respect that and not throw a fit over an author's opinionated work that's over a century old.
14 - Marlon Martin
I think that the use of the word nigger is used to lightly in Mark Twain's "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn". It's use is littered throughout the story and it overshadows the lessons trying to be taught through Huck's journeys with Jim. The same lessons could be taught in other, less degrading and demoralizing works of literture.
Also I believe that through this book it might give the impression to young white readers that they have racial superiority over black people. I say this in reference to the comment Huck makes "I knowed he was white inside" when Jim selflessly sacrficed his own personal safety to protect Tom. These noble acts were only associated with white people in those times and white readers might think it is the same now.
15 - Joshua Shafer
I think that the contents in Twain's novel are okay. Sure the use of language that is conidered racist nowadays is used in it,but I think that's what makes the book what it is and why it is such a great piece of literature. I think Twain did a great job with pushing our ammendment of freedom of speech to its limits. If this book is banned then what good is our freedom of speech.
The use of the word nigger and the moral issues of freeing slaves defined Huck's character. This was needed in order make the last chapters as powerful as they were. I admire twain for writing this piece because it's in your face. I think that's how we should nowadays and stop sugar-coating things. I know that the language may seem disrespectful but that's how it was back then and I think that we should respect that and not throw a fit over an author's opinionated work that's over a century old.
16 - Victor Plenty
It's good for people to see how harmful the racist taint in America's history can be. It's good for people to see this up close and personal, the way only a good storyteller like Twain can make it, now that slavery is no more.
Of course there are other books trying to teach the same moral lessons in ways that are not controversial, with no offensive words. But can you name any, or even one anywhere near as effective as Huckleberry Finn, without having to research carefully first?
Not only is nobody trying to ban those books, nobody bothers to talk about them at all. Nobody ever specifically mentions any of those books. They are only mentioned as a general category of "books we think should be studied instead of Mark Twain's book." That fact in itself should tell you we still need to read and discuss Huckleberry Finn.
17 - Al Barger
Victor, that last paragraph really says it. Exactly that it's getting up under people's skin after 100+ years is a good sign that it's important.
There simply is no other book like Huck Finn, nothing to replace it. You could find some cheap little tract that says "Slavery is bad" but that means little. Much more important, it's not just about slavery, but freedom, and particularly the freedom of conscience that moves Huck to defy God.
Marlon, the way the word nigger is used lightly is important and necessary to communicating the wicked pervasiveness of it. It's not just that one of these people might get mad and call someone a bad name in a fit of anger, but that it was used casually all the time. They mostly didn't even see how mean and degrading they were being.
18 - Bryan Yabut
Mark Twain's "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" hit the subject of racism very well. Although I believe many people thought because it used the word "nigger" made it bad, I doubt that was the author's true meaning. First of all that was how all black people/slaves were reffered to as and people didn't think about it as degrading, or a mean thing to say, etc. Yes, the society thought of black people as dumb or not on the same level as white people as shown in this quote,“Good gracious! Anybody hurt?” (Aunt Sally)
”No’m. Killed a nigger”(Huck Finn)
“Well, it’s lucky; because sometimes people do get hurt.” (Page 249), but that doesn't exactly mean Huck Finn was racist nor does it mean Mark Twain was.
Huck Finn's opinion on black people/slaves started out as racist but thats only because of his influences(Miss Watson,Miss Douglas,his parents)but is shown many times in the novel that Huck isn't really racist or not at least conciously. This is shown with how many chances he had to turn Jim in but he didn't because he couldn't see why people thought of Jim as any lower as anyone else. The fact Huck stayed with Jim this whole time and didn't turn him in shows his bond with Jim. Finally, many people seem to take character's words as Mark Twain's and they are two completely different things. In my opinion when Huck's father says how its wrong for a black man to not be a slave, to dress better than white people, and to be free Mark Twain was just trying to show how absurd that kind of thinking is, but that's just my two cents.
19 - sydney
I don't think the people who banned the book, believe that its message is racist or that twain himself was racist, but that younger students are not mature enough to grapple the semantics of the word nigger when delivered by a white character, or in a white novel, or read aloud by a white student etc. There are other larger concerns though…
Though a mature audience is perfectly capable of reading Huck Finn and of distinguishing the novels very relevant and noble criticism of American Society, young audiences, and particularly, young black audiences have a much more complicated issue to deal with. That is that slavery and racism is a subject loaded with very raw emotions and the humiliations suffered by the black people in America's very recent history brings about very difficult questions to a black reader. These questions strike to the core of a black person’s self-awareness and ego. If they aren’t prepared to deal with the emotional implications of their dark past they could react poorly to it. In fact I think they could receive an emotional message that is totally opposite of the literal message.
All this is what I imagine to be the issue, and I am reasonably certain that no one is suggesting Mark Twain wasn't promoting racism, rather than condoning it.
IF you read the book again you can pay attention to the Jim's character and see how humiliating he might be to a black reader. Though Jim has a heart of gold, his socialization leaves him at the beck and call of a small child who teases him and plays humiliating games with him. The Huck clearly likes Jim, the power structures are completely subverted to an outrageous and embarrassing effect.
Though twain wrote Jim's character as a biting satire which pointed out the destructive and sad nature of institutionalized racism and its dehumanizing effects on the blacks of the time, it is none the less hard for a young person to understand this. If they don't grasp it than it is simply humiliating to the black audience who seeks to identify with the Character of Jim -- not just empathize, but identify. We can all sympathize with Jim, but it’s essential that a young black audience have an intelligent, strong model from which to juxtapose with Jim. Huck Finn doesn’t offer that.
I agree that the book is too complicated and dangerous for really young audiences. However, I think it is appropriate for most audiences 17 and older. IT should be reserved for senior audiences. There are plenty of other novels which deal with the same issues but are dealt with in a more adolescent sensitive way. Mark Twain’s place in literary Cannon is secure, and universities and college students will have plenty of opportunity to enjoy it.
20 - Bryan Yabut
*referred
21 - Al Barger
Sydney, I appreciate your balanced and thoughtful comments, but I think you WAY underestimate young people. They deal with stuff in the popular culture every day FAR more degrading to blacks, 50 Cent for example.
Moreover, considering the rocky social and emotional terrain involved, it would be particularly good to have this in a classroom setting. That way, they can get input from teachers and other classmates to help them unscramble the meanings. That called LEARNING, and that's exactly what schools are for.
On the other hand, trying to ban the book would tend to make it sound cool and dangerous, which might get the kiddies interested in this classic piece of literature.
22 - sydney
Ya with regards to my comments in my last post and your view that young students could handle the heavy issues, I'll admit that you may very well be right.
However, my experince as a teacher suggest that they probably wouldn't. My opinion anyway.
Your right that students are extremely media savey and are capable of accessing layered discourses within many media texts. They are none-the-less deficient in many areas of language and higher thought.
ITs funny... sometimes they understand things in a far more complex way then many adults (in particular when it comes to reading media texts), but they are way far behind in other ways. I find my students very resistant to accessing literary texts on anything but a literal level. Perhaps that is my shortcommings as an instructor...
The other thing is that I think its very difficult for me , or any other white person to understand how huck finn makes a black peroson feel. This is a question only black audiences can answer. All the comments made in my last post come from my thoughts and feelings as I read the novel, and my efforts to view the novel from a black's perspective. IT is neccesarily inadequate. Only a point for discussion....
Thanks for the response.
23 - Nicole Padre
In Mark Twain's novel, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, he emphasizes racism throughout the story. While reading the book, there was one point that caught my attention. When Jim, Miss Watson's slave, talks to Huck about his family, Huck worries whether or not he made the right decision to run away with Jim as said: "Well, I can tell you it made me all over trembly and feverish, too, to hear him, because I begun to get it through my head that he was most free-and who was to blame for it? Why, me." This shows that Huck's morals made it seem wrong to help a slave run away, but if he did not help Jim, part of him would say that it was not right to not save someone, who seems like a good person, even if Jim is a black slave.
One example of how Mark Twain represented that Huck thought of black people different from white is, “It was fifteen minutes before I could work myself up to go and humble myself to a nigger,” As Huck said this, he does not regret apologizing to Jim because of making a fool of him thinking their separation in the fog was a dream. In this quote, the author shows that Huck has some sympathy for Jim and is a person nonetheless, even if Jim is a different color and knows he is a slave. As you go deeper in the novel you can see that Huck learns more about Jim as a person rather than thinking of him as a mere slave. In short, Huck finds it difficult to decide whether helping Jim is right or to listen to what he was brought up to know that blacks are inferior to them.
24 - Al Barger
Yes, and the whole book is full of these kind of moments, as Huck has to learn to make some kind of sense of the world and the races- what he's been taught versus what he sees in Jim.
Sydney, I guess I just don't mind too much if the book upsets some people, black or white. Maybe they need to be upset a little now and then. The world's full of tough topics that have to be grappled with, which is one of the useful functions of art.
25 - Andrew May
Samuel Langhorne Clemens's, better known as Mark Twain, Huckleberry Finn has been one of the most controversial novels ever written. This is mainly due to the fact of the racism predominantly found throughout the book. One point that strikes this note is when Huck, mistaken for Tom Sawyer, talks to Aunt Sally about his made-up trip on a steamboat. He said there was a blowout on the cylinder head, the chamber in a steamboat in which steam acts upon the piston, and when his 'aunt' asked if anybody was hurt, he replied, "No'm. Killed a nigger." This shows that African Americans were thought of as second class. This reflects a lot of opinions in the South then; the racial inferiority of the black people to the whites.
While all of this is quite apparent to readers throughout the book, one must step back a moment and look at the time when the book was written, and the situation at the time. This book was written in the 1800's, when there was still racial prejudice, and the Civil War had not ended too long ago. Changes to society, even through war, are not wrought in days or even years. So Mark Twain was still used to slavery and rewound time a bit in his book. So basically, in his time it was not racism, or not truly it yet, it was simply a fact and part of everyday life.