My Huck Finn essay is going to center around this general argument: of course the book is racist and off-color, but it's biggest problem lays in that it is terribly written - the perfect example of an author who a) didn't care and b) didn't know what to write. It is a good book to be taught because of it's controversy but also because it is an excellent example of poor literature.
Sources used will include Lionel Trilling, TS Eliot, Leo Marx, and Jane Smiley. The first two do not agree with me: they thought it was an amazing, classic novel that was perfect in every way and not at all racist. Lionel Trilling will help speak to the horribly writing and the scatter-brained-ness while TS Eliot focuses more on the idea of "Boy and River" and how idealistic and moral the book was (although he made an good point in that the depiction of life in the South was very accurate). Leo Marx believes that the book was ruined in the last thirteen chapters where Tom Sawyer comes in and ruins it (very true but the book was a goner way before Tom Sawyer reappears). Jane Smiley absolutely hated the book period, although she focuses mostly on the tasteless way the African Americans were depicted rather than how poorly it was written.
The passages I plan to use from Huck Finn include our first depiction of Jim, which classified him as a "dumb Negro" and set him up as a caricature; the last thirteen chapters, which quash any growth that Jim has had as a character; and the contrast between when Huck and Jim are on the river as to when Huck is on shore. From the articles we read, I will use quotes that especially address the last thirteen chapters, the "moral growth" of Huck, the narrative, and the racism present in the novel.
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ReplyDeletedon't you thik that Twain's way of characoriziing Jim in the beginning made it possible for him to bring the idea that Huck was slowly, throughout the book , learning more about Jim and learning to like him as a person and forget his previouse "dumb negro" ideas?
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ReplyDeleteI think it will be easy to make the argument that Huck Finn was not a well-written novel, but isn't the picaresque style that illuminates Huck and Jims's journery down the river? Each adventure is a new chance for Huck and Jim to build upon their profound friendship. I think Twain was trying to express life as accurately as possible, and by depicting Jim as he was most commonly thought of during that time period, he succeeds in setting up the novel as a very real account of life in the South. Also i think the ending reveals the pressures of society to conform to its racial norms, and no matter how far Huck has come in fleeing such rules, he ultimately falls victim to Tom's charades. Also I dont agree that Jim has grown, i think Huck is the character who has transformed the most, and we see that his transformation is not completely reversed by the ending, because he says he must head west to avoid being civilized.
ReplyDeleteyeah.
ReplyDelete1 this book is not racist
ReplyDelete2 I don't agree that the book is terribly written it is praised and held so high it the literary world because of the use of the vernacular !
1 you don't have to agree
ReplyDelete2 Hannah can believe what she wants about the book
3 Lay off!
Hannah,
ReplyDeleteYour post seems to have engendered some interesting commentary (some of it useful). I like the way you seem to be neatly side-stepping the larger issue of race by focusing on the novel's (in your view) lack of literary merit. An essay which trashes the book AS a book should be fun to write (and, I hope, read!). Good luck with this.