Prokins 1
Shada Prokins
Mr. Flandor
English 3
17 December 2012
Huckleberry Finn and His Moral Efforts
Should morals be based on experience and opinion, or should morals be a composition of what society believes? In the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain, the main character, Huckleberry, is constantly changing his moral beliefs by battling between choosing what he knows is morally right verses what society believes to be correct. When Huck is accompanied by others he seems to reflect the same ideas as those individuals. Huck finds his own voice and beliefs once he is secluded from the rest of his society.
While Huck is living in society he has to obey rules. Huck does not like any of the rules that the Widow and Miss Watson have given him. Huck asks if he can break a rule to smoke and the Widow states that it is, “…a mean practice and…that [he] must try to not do it any more” (2).
Huck has no real state of authority and because of this he states that reading about Moses is a waste of time because he does not “take stock in dead people” (2). Huck starts to obey the rules when it is to spite his father who says that he does not need to attend school or church. Huck’s father thinks that Huck will become smarter than him and it scares him. To show his father that he is smart he “read for half a minute” (20) until his father became outraged and stated, “I won’t have it” (20). Huck eventually conforms to the widow and Miss Watson; once Huck is kidnapped he also conforms to his Pap’s ways. Huck conforms to the various ideas around him because he is constantly being told that his ways are wrong forcing him to change.
Prokins 2
After Huck eventually fakes his own death, he strikes out on his own. After meeting Jim on Jackson’s Island the two agree to escape and set out on a raft together. As Huck spends time with Jim and gets to know him, Huck learns that Jim is a real person too. Once Huck works up the courage to apologize to Jim, Huck states that he, “warn’t ever sorry for it afterwards, neither”
(87). In society’s eyes Huck should feel more guilt after apologizing to a slave because slaves are considered property and not people. Huck starts to see Jim as a father figure. While Huck is suppose to be on watch during the night he starts to get “pretty sleepy” (129) and so Jim would
“stand the first half” (129) of Huck’s shift for him. Huck is grateful that Jim is “always [a] mighty good” (129) person because it gives him a role model. When Huck develops his own opinion of Jim it shows how he is disregarding society’s influence on him and becoming his own person. During Huck and Jim’s adventures they meet up with two con men. These men lie about everything including their names. Each man claims to be royalty, one claims to be a Duke and the other claims to be a King. Both men force Huck to evaluate his ethics in morals. Huck must decide between choosing with or against the King and
Related Documents: Huckleberry Finn and His Moral Efforts Essay
returning Jim to slavery. As one of the central idea, racism is constantly reoccurring in the novel of The Adventure of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain. However, though racism is constantly mentioned and exemplify, there was never a direct determined conclusion given by Mark Twain. In one hand, there were many scholars and readers argues that The Adventure of Huckleberry Finn is a racist book because of its overwhelmingly use of the offensive word" nigger". An example of racism would be Pap, Huck's…
or not. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain, is the tale of how a young boy in the rural South breaks free from his abusive father, and consequentially, everything else he has ever known. With just a runaway slave as a companion, Huckleberry’s story is bursting with Twain’s true thoughts and criticisms of society seen through his eyes. Through symbolic characters, Mark Twain criticizes the hypocrisy and corruption of human society, and uses Huckleberry Finn himself as a way to show that…
Mark Twain lived during a time period called the “Jacksonian Democracy” which was the political movement toward greater democracy for the common man symbolized by American politician Andrew Jackson and his supporters. Mark was born Samuel Clemens in Florida, Missouri in 1835. When he was just four years old, Twain and his family moved to Hannibal, Missouri on the Mississippi River. In Hannibal, slavery was an issue for Twain. “The AfricanAmerican population in Hannibal was around 5 percent, yet in 1850 nearly a quarter of people there were slaves…
Zoe Williamson English III AP, 3rd Hour November 29, 2014 Huckleberry Finn: Good vs. Evil The nineteenth century was a time of major moral conflict for those in the United States. In the years following the Civil War, both the north and the south were conflicted about whether or not their actions were morally just or not. In his novel, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain pointed out both the good and rather unfortunate sides of humankind and showed not only the nation, but the world what…
Honors American Literature 13 December 2012 Role of Jim in Huckleberry Finn During the late 1800’s post civil war, the reconstruction era surfaced in the union. The reconstruction, a political program designed to reintegrate the defeated South into the Union as a slavery-free region, began to fail. The North imposed harsh measures, which only embittered the South. Concerned about maintaining power, many Southern politicians began an effort to control and oppress the black men and women whom the war…
conflicts seems came to an end as the dawn of impending union. However, collision never extinct from history, or avoid by human population just as the word “conflicts” never vanish in Twain’s work of art. In this sense, the novel “The Adventures of Huckleberry” Finn is a reflection and demonstration of conflicts. Mark Twain explores the complexity and collision over many issues in the full-of-conflicted novel. The book reveals not only the struggles between conscience and mortality, civilization and natural…
Moral Shackles Huck Finn’s individual freedoms and lack thereof The definition of freedom is both relative and rapidly changing; what one thinks makes an individual free could be drastically different from what someone else thinks. Additionally, one’s idea of what freedom is and how it can be attained do not necessarily stay consistent over time. Both Jonathan Bennett and Nomy Arpaly offer their ideas of what it takes for an individual to achieve freedom. For Bennett, a strong intellect is the…
Chapter 19: Immigration, Urbanization, and Everyday Life, 1860-1900 *How was a city defined between 1870 and 1900? --In terms of the late 19th century, a city was defined as having more than 25,000 residents; the importance of this distinction is the rapid growth of cities in the late 19th century. *How did the newly form cities differ from rural America? --The rural America that had defined the country from its inception until the Civil War was one of personal relations and commonalities between…
Feng Hua Tan 11B, History 01/22/2015 Chapter 25 - America Moves to the City, 1865-1900 I. The Urban Frontier A. Cities grew up and out, with famed architects perfecting skyscrapers. 1. The city grew from a small compact one that people could walk through to get around to a huge metropolis that required commuting by electric trolleys. 2. Electricity, indoor plumbing, and telephones made city life more alluring. B. Department stores like Macy’s and Marshall Field’s provided urban…
