Mark Twain’s classic tale ,’’The adventures of Huckleberry Finn “ is a mirror of the deeply embedded racist attitudes of the Deep South in the 1880’s. Even if at the first sight this book seems like a simple children’s adventure book, it contains an extremely controversial message. Through the entire novel, the writer tries to show the ignorance of the people and the mistakes of the society. Even though this book is a mirror of the reality from that time it is not a racist novel, nor is Mark Twain a racist author.
There are many books written about this novel, racism and slavery and a lot of opinions about it. Opinions about the novel’s correctness arise and critics are divided into detractors and supporters ( Toni Morrison) . One of the most direct detractors to this book was John H. Wallace ( The Case Against Huckleberry Finn) ‘’ The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain is the most grotesque example of racist trash ever written’’ . ‘’ Huck Finn is racist, whether its author intended it to be or not’’ ( Wallace 20)
My aim is to show that the abolitionist movement is present in the whole book. It is true that all the cruel parts of the slavery is presented in there but only because we must understand the whole context, not because Twain support those ideas. The author uses the technique of realism for us to see that these are real people and real emotions.
Some critics support the idea that Twain was racist because he used constantly the word ‘ni**er’.
There is an obvious contrast of the mindset depicted in the Twain’s novel compared to our time. Nowadays, the use of the word ‘ni**er’ is slanderous and is not acceptable anymore. At that time, this term was not necessary offensive. For all persons it was almost equal with something which denotes an insignificant object- dehumanizing term. Wallace in his writing support the idea that this word should not be allowed to be thought in schools and that this book should be banned. He supports the idea that this term ‘’ridicule the black people’’.
‘‘ Anybody hurt ?’’ ‘’ No’m, killed a ni**er’’ ‘’ Well, it’s lucky, because sometimes people do get hurt’’
( Chapter 32)
Even if this word enrage the persons who read in our days the book, the replacement of this word would distorts American history. There is no other term that can replace it. Thousands of civilizations have had slaves, but in no place they have been such abused and mistreated. I think substituting this word will take away the deepest meaning of the book.
Slaves of that time period were not provided any formal education or any independent thought – they were abused and continually mistreated (physically and psychically). The dialect which Jim is speaking indicate his lack of education that white people refuses to provide to slaves. They were viewed as a property which were mentally inferior but in the same time, this thing allow white people to maintain total control of them. ‘’ En when I wake up en fine you back agin’ all safe en soun’ , de tears come en I could a got down on my knees en kiss you’ foot I’s so thankful’’ ( Chapter 8 )
The slaves also didn’t know to read. We can see very clear this thing in the episode when Huck and Jim after ” borrowing’’ some things from people saw a poster with a reward for Jim. Jim asks Huck to read for him what is written in there. The poster announced the reward for the person who bring Jim back. It is a historic fact that in the abolitionist period there were not modest amounts of money for the persons which bring back the runaway slaves ( dead or alive).
Some enslaved people lived in nuclear family – all the members of that family belonged to the same owner. Others lived in near-nuclear families – the father has a different owner and could live several miles away. In this book, Jim is inhumanly ripped away from his wife and children. During the whole novel, his purpose was to become a free man and to set free his family.
The most part of the book is historical accurate even if the details aren’t realistic. It reveals the society’s pressure and conscious on how blacks should be treated. I believe that the book have a anti-racist interpretation . The comparison between Jim and Pap highlights the anti-racist component of the book. Pap is Huck’s biological father, which is uneducated , rash and alcoholic . Jim is also uneducated, but it is protective, loving and humane. He is exactly the opposite of Pap. Although in those times the slaves are dehumanized, from this perspective, Pap is the victim of this thing – irony .
When we talk about slavery, we immediately think about ni**ers and their oppressors. Twain compares Jim’s slavery to Miss Watson equally horrid as Huck’s to his father because they both end up running away . Even though Pap was more like and animal than a person ( and this was not a secret for the other characters), Jim is the one suspected for Huck’s murder only because he was black and he was a runaway slave. When we talk about Huck, we can think about him in relation with Pap, but also with Widow Douglass and Miss Watson. They put Huck under a kind of psychological slavery. They tried to “sivilize’’ him. As Jim, Huck wants to be free, away from rules that must be kept in society – he was a slave of the society.
In the beginning, Huck addresses to Jim with the N word. ‘’[…] Huck Finn helped a ni**er to get his freedom’’ then he claims ‘’ All right then, I’ll go to hell…’’ He recognized Jim as a friend. His vision changes. ‘’People will call me a low-down abolitionist […] but I don’t care’’ ( Chapter 8) . In the end, Huck achieves a certain degree of freedom. It is not about the freedom from ‘’sivilization’’ but from the rigid mindset of the racist South. From an abused little boy, Huck Finn becomes an enlightened human being.
Ralph Waldo Ellison said, “Huckleberry Finn knew, as did Mark Twain, that Jim was not only a slave but a human being [and] a symbol of humanity… and in freeing Jim, Huck makes a bid to free himself of the conventionalized evil taken for civilization by the town…”
<< However, by giving Jim one of the central voices in the novel and demonstrating Jim’s capacity to feel deep, human emotions, Twain demonstrates the contradictions of his culture, portraying Jim through the minstrel stereotype meanwhile revealing the fundamental reality of African American humanity.>> ( ‘’ Was Huck Black?’’)
Living in this period, Twain’s thoughts are presented to us through Huck’s voice and his way of thinking. Even though Huck lived in that society and he was in a way a slave of the current thinking , he could escape from that. Twain present us the good part of the souls’ slave and the animal part of the white’s. We can see it very clearly that he agreed with the ‘’ low-abolitionists’’ creating the character of Huck and dehumanizing the ‘’superior beings’’.
Wallace agree with Marguerite Barnett (1982) when she points out that ‘’ By making blacks inhuman, American whites could destroy […] equal treatment’’. As I said in the beginning of the essay, Twain points out that things just to show us the historical context in which the book was written.
To conclude, Toni Morrison in ‘’ The defense of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’’ points out very clearly the fact that the black ones are not mocked in this book. ‘’ Twain’s black characters were most certainly based on real people. His nonfiction observations and comments on ‘actual’ blacks are full of references to their guilelessness, intelligence, creativity, wit, caring, etc. […] none in portrayed as relentlessly idiotic’’ ( pg 106) . Mark Twain succeeded to express a lot of voices and different mindsets in only one famous and controversial book. Personally I strongly agree with the critics which support this book. “I have no color prejudices nor caste prejudices nor creed prejudices. All I care to know is that a man is a human being, and that is enough for me; he can’t be any worse.” ( Mark Twain)