The Impacts of Huck and Jim's Escape in Huckleberry Finn Essay

Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Thesis: The positive and negative impact of Huck and Jim's escape.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was written by Mark Twain and it was first published in 1884. This book was written in vernacular or common speech and this is considered as one of the first great American Novels. In the January 2007 issue of Time Magazine, the book placed fifth in their list of the 10 Greatest Books of all Time.

Mark Twain or Samuel Langhorne Clemens was born on November 30, 1835 and died on April 21, 1910. Mark twain is a lecturer, humorist, satirist, and a writer. He also wrote the novel The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Twain was a very popular author in the United States.

Twain originally titled the book Huckleberry Finn's Autobiography". For the next several years Twain work on the manuscript on and off and he abandoned his original plan of following the development of Huck's adulthood. Upon completion, it was then titled as "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" which was closely paralleled its predecessors.

Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is a story about Huck's escape from his father and Jim's escape from Miss Watson. Huck wanted to escape from his father because his father wanted to get all his money. Jim was Miss Watson's slave and he heard that Miss Watson and Widow Douglas had plans of selling him, and because he was afraid that he will no longer see his family, he decided to run away. Huck made other people believed that he was dead. Jim and Huck's father are the townspeople suspects of Hucks death. To prevent Jim's capture and sale, they both decided to leave the place.

Both of them were able to escape from the cruel people. As they journey along the river Huck played tricks on Jim, which made Jim upset, Huck then realized that Jim was not only a slave, but he was a human and a friend who deserves to have a good life. Huck was able to free Jim against Miss Watson's plans and cruelty. Huck was then convinced that Jim deserves to be free.

As they journey along the river they met two men, these men were Duke and Dauphins, and both of them were frauds and thieves. Upon their journey they met different kinds of people there are drunkards, murderers, swindlers, bullies, lynches, thieves, frauds, child abusers, liars and hypocrites. Leaving their town made their life more miserable. Jim was captured and sold to Silas Phelps by Dauphin. Silas Phelps was Tom Sawyers Uncle. Aunt Sally thought that Huck was Tom, Huck pretended to be Tom for him to free Jim, and when Tom arrived, he agreed with Huck's plan. Never did Jim and Huck realize that Tom was a traitor. Tom made Huck and Jim believed that he was helping them, but Tom on the other hand was giving information to his uncle about their plans of escaping. During the chase, Tom was shot on the leg, and both Jim and Tom were captured.

Huck and Jim was able to escape from the cruelty of the people around them, little did they know that what would happen in their lives would be more miserable. The positive impact on this was when both of them were able to escape from Huck's father and Miss Watson. Huck was able to free Jim and they were able to find true friendship. The negative impact on this was when they left their town and encountered more cruel people which made their lives more difficult. Along the river they both found true friendship, and along the river they encountered two men who would make their lives more miserable.

References:

Jehlen, Myra (1995-05-26). "Banned in Concord: Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Classic American Literature", in Forrest G. Robinson (ed.): The Cambridge Companion to Mark Twain. Cambridge University Press, 107-109.