I've read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn many times: first as a teenager, then as a young man in college and until last week, as a thirty-something adult. Each reading brought new insights about Twain's take on the American experience. He created unforgettable and timeless characters, the likes of which still exist from sea to shining sea. Drifting down the Mississippi River with Huck and Jim is a sublime experience. Twain captures the majesty and serenity of the river and uses it as a powerful metaphor for their troubled lives. Both are fleeing civilization because it represents an intolerable set of rules; Huck's life has been shaped by poverty, cruelty and neglect and Jim is an escaped slave. Huck, though still a boy, is an astute observer and Jim becomes the first and only adult who deserves his respect and loves him unconditionally.
n  n
Twain published this at the close of Reconstruction and the birth of Jim Crow. For all his minstrel show characteristics, Jim is morally superior to all the scoundrels they encounter, particularly the King and the Duke, two grifters who hijack the raft to save their own necks. In Huck's increasingly radical voice, Twain skewers all kinds of injustices: not just the inhumanity of slavery, but also, false piety and vigilantism. Masquerading as an adventure story, it is a celebration of the glories of the Mississippi, a comic tour de force and a ringing indictment of American malfeasance and hypocrisy. This is arguably the Great American Novel. Just imagine what Twain would have to say about our current state of affairs.

2/5/15 Update

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/05/boo...

Updated 3/22/14

Becoming Mark Twain:

http://www.salon.com/2014/03/22/how_m...

NOTICE
PERSONS attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot.
BY ORDER OF THE AUTHOR
...
Jim said that bees won't sting idiots, but I didn't believe that, because I tried them lots of times myself and they wouldn't sting me.
...
Human beings can be awful cruel to one another.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn opens in the aftermath of  The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and for a time, it has the same joyous feel as the boys continue their antics of rebellious 12-year-olds. But the return of Huck Finn’s drunk of a father, Pap, hints at the darker, more serious themes of this novel. After being kidnapped and beaten, Huck escapes his father by faking his own death and then going on the run. He soon crosses paths with a runaway slave, Jim, and together they raft their way down the Mississippi.

Like its predecessor, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is largely a series of vignettes with a very loose overarching plot. Huck and Jim travel from Missouri through Kentucky and Arkansas and into the antebellum South, getting into scrapes and making escapes along the way. There’s some great humor in their conversations on the raft; their argument about the wisdom of King Solomon is priceless. And there’s classic Twain satire and exposing of hypocrisy here, from the feuding Grangerford and Shepardson families to the con men known as the Duke and the King.

So why was I reading this classic novel during Banned Books Week? For that, we have to talk about race and racism. The characters here (and the author, for that matter) are products of their 19th century time. The n-word is used relentlessly in this book, even by the slaves themselves, and it is jarring. Huck says casually racist things here that are heartbreakingly awful; on one occasion, for example, he compliments Jim by thinking “I knowed he was white inside.” And some critics fairly read this book as irredeemably problematic, reinforcing racist stereotypes and repeatedly deriving humor from a variation of a minstrel show.

But I come down on the side of those who read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn as transcending and challenging the racist stereotypes of the time. Huck has been taught by society all his life to view blacks as slaves, as less than. And at a pivotal moment, he writes a letter to report where Jim can be found by his master, and at first he thinks the letter is the right thing to do:

I felt good and all washed clean of sin for the first time I had ever felt so in my life, and I knowed I could pray now. But I didn’t do it straight off, but laid the paper down and set there thinking—thinking how good it was all this happened so, and how near I come to being lost and going to hell. And went on thinking. And got to thinking over our trip down the river; and I see Jim before me all the time: in the day and in the night-time, sometimes moonlight, sometimes storms, and we a-floating along, talking and singing and laughing. But somehow I couldn’t seem to strike no places to harden me against him, but only the other kind. I’d see him standing my watch on top of his’n, ‘stead of calling me, so I could go on sleeping; and see him how glad he was when I come back out of the fog; and when I come to him again in the swamp, up there where the feud was; and such-like times; and would always call me honey, and pet me and do everything he could think of for me, and how good he always was; and at last I struck the time I saved him by telling the men we had small-pox aboard, and he was so grateful, and said I was the best friend old Jim ever had in the world, and the only one he’s got now; and then I happened to look around and see that paper.

It was a close place. I took it up, and held it in my hand. I was a-trembling, because I’d got to decide, forever, betwixt two things, and I knowed it. I studied a minute, sort of holding my breath, and then says to myself:

“All right, then, I’ll go to hell”—and tore it up.

Huck says the wrong thing, and uses racist language, again and again throughout this book. But he ultimately recognizes and acts on his and Jim’s shared humanity and equality. That might be the best we can realistically expect from a book published in the 1880s. And some days, it’s obvious that our society has not come nearly as far on this score as we’d like to think we have.

Is The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn the Great American Novel? It’s written by an immortal, epically talented writer. It was one of the first books to truly capture the course, plain spoken language of its time. And by focusing on racism and slavery, it speaks to America’s original sin. So yeah, it just might be, even though I prefer  To Kill a Mockingbird. Highly recommended.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Hilarious, colourful, refreshingly simple, chaotic mess that life throws at you, ...splat in the face.

tom sawyer was a vexation on my spirit and I’m so glad I finished this so I never have to hear from him again

n   “Human beings can be awful cruel to one another.” n

Like many, I’ve read this book when I was a kid (twice actually, as a kid and a teen), and this was the first time I revisited it as a (hopefully) fully functional adult. And this time my reactions to it were quite magnified. The parts I liked before I loved now, and the parts that irked me in childhood now irritated the living daylights out of me.

Huckleberry Finn is a classic, and about half of it deserves that designation. Those are the parts where Twain shines — the parts with the mesmerizing and majestic Mississippi river, the ability to write injustice and abuse without proselytizing and falling into “misery porn” trap, and the sharp observation of the folks of the rural American South.

n “We catched fish and talked, and we took a swim now and then to keep off sleepiness. It was kind of solemn, drifting down the big, still river, laying on our backs looking up at the stars, and we didn’t ever feel like talking loud, and it warn’t often that we laughed – only a little kind of a low chuckle.”

And then there are the parts when severe tonal dissonance kicks in and the whiplash of being in another book sets in. It first starts with a bit of annoyance in those endless “king” and “duke” chapters, but peaks at impressive rate once Tom Sawyer and his hijinks pop up. Tom Sawyer, who belongs in a kids book at best, whose overactive imagination in this situation is no longer cute but dangerous and cruel and incredibly thoughtless — and almost physically painful. (Yes, I know Tom Sawyer is supposed to come across as ridiculous here, but it went on for way too long).

Oh, and how bleak and pointlessly violent was the world of rural American South of the 1830? Sometimes I wonder if humanity really deserves to continue on. Yes, there are quite a few funny parts (Huck’s rant about Henry VIII many “achievements” - from Domesday book to malmsey wine drowning to Boston Tea Party comes to mind*), but my overall take this time is of resolutely grim life. Slavery, violence, alcoholism, cruelty, ignorance, disregard for rights of others - I need to stare at the wall for a little while now.

* My favorite rant here, under spoiler tag for brevity sake:

“My, you ought to seen old Henry the Eight when he was in bloom. He was a blossom. He used to marry a new wife every day, and chop off her head next morning. And he would do it just as indifferent as if he was ordering up eggs. 'Fetch up Nell Gwynn,' he says. They fetch her up. Next morning, 'Chop off her head!' And they chop it off. 'Fetch up Jane Shore,' he says; and up she comes, Next morning, 'Chop off her head'—and they chop it off. 'Ring up Fair Rosamun.' Fair Rosamun answers the bell. Next morning, 'Chop off her head.' And he made every one of them tell him a tale every night; and he kept that up till he had hogged a thousand and one tales that way, and then he put them all in a book, and called it Domesday Book—which was a good name and stated the case. You don't know kings, Jim, but I know them; and this old rip of ourn is one of the cleanest I've struck in history. Well, Henry he takes a notion he wants to get up some trouble with this country. How does he go at it—give notice?—give the country a show? No. All of a sudden he heaves all the tea in Boston Harbor overboard, and whacks out a declaration of independence, and dares them to come on. That was his style—he never give anybody a chance. He had suspicions of his father, the Duke of Wellington. Well, what did he do? Ask him to show up? No—drownded him in a butt of mamsey, like a cat. S'pose people left money laying around where he was—what did he do? He collared it. S'pose he contracted to do a thing, and you paid him, and didn't set down there and see that he done it—what did he do? He always done the other thing. S'pose he opened his mouth—what then? If he didn't shut it up powerful quick he'd lose a lie every time. That's the kind of a bug Henry was; and if we'd a had him along 'stead of our kings he'd a fooled that town a heap worse than ourn done. I don't say that ourn is lambs, because they ain't, when you come right down to the cold facts; but they ain't nothing to that old ram, anyway. All I say is, kings is kings, and you got to make allowances. Take them all around, they're a mighty ornery lot. It's the way they're raised.” n

Being a novel of its time it doesn’t go where I wish it did, but even classics belong to their time, and this one is not an exception. And people needed to start like Huck — deciding that ”All right, then, I'll GO to hell” — because you have to start somewhere.

3.5 stars, and my brain is busily editing Tom Sawyer out of this story).

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Buddy read with Nastya.

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Also posted on my blog.

Huck Finn is kidnapped by his daddy, but he escapes. During his escape he meets Jim, the slave of his foster mother, who has run away. The two stay together and travel on. On their journey they meet a "duke" and a "king". But due to an incident, Jim is arrested and Huck tries to free him together with Tom Sawyer. The story is exciting and funny, especially the narrative style is very amusing.

n  "It was enough to make a body ashamed of the human race."n

4.5 stars — What a devilishly clever Trojan Horse of a novel this is! Dressing up as a folksy, comical story of boyhood adventure, what in reality is a scathing satire of the rank hypocrisy and moral rot that has been infecting the soul of this country ever since its inception and Original Sin.

Walnut Grove and Mayberry, this is not. Rather, Twain takes us on a Dante-esqe journey deeper and deeper into the truly deranged and delusional American South. His America is a colorful collection of murderous thieves, feuding fools, greedy con-men, gullible rubes, and religious hypocrites. Same today as it ever was! (If this is the former "greatness" to which all the MAGA morons so eagerly aspire, they're a lot closer to reaching their goal than they realize.)

It's a shame that the relentless onslaught of toxic but historically accurate language and outdated racial stereotypes will (understandably) prevent this from being discovered by contemporary readers, because even nearly 150 years later, it still holds up an unflattering but brutally honest mirror to American society that we need to look into now more than ever. Twain was revealing and interrogating things like "white supremacy" and "white privilege" long before they ever became 21st century buzzwords.

All while telling an engrossing and poignant coming-of-age story about friendship, freedom, and a young boy grappling with the growing dissonance between his own observed reality and moral instincts on the one hand, and the nonsensical religious bullshit and racism he's been indoctrinated with since birth on the other. In other words, precisely the kind of "woke" YA propaganda that conservatives are actively trying to remove from schools and libraries as we speak.

I know Twain's characterization of Jim has been puzzling and polarizing readers and scholars for a century and a half, but it wasn't nearly as problematic as I'd feared, and in fact Jim quickly became my favorite character in the entire novel. Obviously, we're only ever seeing Jim through the eyes of an uneducated preteen White boy born and raised in the rural South, a biased perspective that is just inherently and inescapably going to be limiting, and include some dehumanizing stereotypes.

But reading between the lines, I see Twain doing some sophisticated, subversive stuff here, constantly reminding us of Jim's (and other enslaved characters') complex emotions and full humanity long before Huck begins to recognize those things for himself. Scene after scene, Jim is almost always the smartest, wisest, funniest, and most compassionate character in the room (or raft, as it were).

Only thing holding this back from a full five stars is that disappointing clunker of an ending. Bringing Tom Sawyer back into the story felt like the 19th century equivalent of "fan service" rather than good storytelling, and I pretty much HATED everything from that point on. If Tom was a pompous little brat before, he's absolutely insufferable here and those final chapters were a real slog to get through.

Kako učiniti opet TO sa istim likovima, ne opeTOvati a biti bolji? Kuda nastaviti putešestvije onda kada su se Pustolovine - bekstvo od kuće na poludivlju adu, svedočenje ubistvu, krimi-sudska drama, lov na blago, prva ljubav i izbavljenje iz pećinskog lavirinta - već poklopile? Šta nakon "Doživljaja Toma Sojera", i s njim i bez njega, to je u najkraćem problemska nepoznata Marka Tvena.

A vektor prvoosumnjičenog književnog mangupa vidno je drugačiji u odnosu na vektor Haklberija Fina. Prvoga kao tip socijalno prilagodljivog vetropira put ipak navodi ka socijalizaciji, otud je i prihvatljivije štivo za domaću lektiru. Kolokvijalno, prozezajmo se, ali tako da posle možemo da se iskuliramo [i uložimo novce u banku]. Drugi je zanavek marginalan, štrkljast, pundrav uprkos svemu, šaume glavnicom skitalački-slobodarske (recimo: odelo mi suviše lepo da bi bilo udobno), s traumatizirajućim porodičnim okoljem (otac-lupež-alkoholičar koji vas bije zato što idete u školu!), u žigošućem miljeu (rođen sam u zadnjem vagonu na pruzi..., drugo je to ali pogađa žicu). HF je ime kojem se olako ne otvaraju nijedna vrata, znamo to još onomad kada će zalupati pozno u "DTS"-u! Na prvi i potonji pogled, neodoljivi oskar za sporednu ulogu.

Stoga je odviše primamljivo ne dozvoliti mu da ne postane prva violina, da progovori i proluta, samostalno. Da ostavi iza leđa siguran prihod i udoban život - društvene cipele su ono što žulja, aha, pankerski No fun! - i Toma Sojera u fabularnom priobalju - aha, ovde je ionako donkihotovski odlepio! Fin je arhebitnik, duša lutalaštva, pa zato pri naivno ponovnom prisajedinjenju odjapadljivom Tomu Sojeru i može da prilepi, s rečima znakovito-intuitivnijim nego se u prvi mah čini: "Ja se ne vraćam - nisam ni 'otišao'." Vala zato ga se i upucalo u nogu, a ne samo zbog zakrečavanja jednog raspleta!
- Hej! Pssst! Koga? - Ma samo ti-ću...

Porinuti Haklberija u rečnu pikaresku niz američku žilu kucavicu, splavariti kroz mladinsko-južnjačku varijantu "Srca tame", čekati i gledati šta će da se zbude i na kakve će se sve živopisne dangube, probisvete i potčoveke ka središtu Juga nabasati. U ovom pomalo robinzonovskom "how convenient realizmu" - a nije baš da "Avanture" nisu posve ni bezgrešne, ali o tome nekom drugom prilikom, znatno docnije, u nekom drugom životu - iznosiće Haklberi Fin stavove ponekad i sa pankoidnom britkošću, ponekad i sa naivnom jasnoćom - eto da "Ljudi mogu da budu strašno svirepi jedni prema drugima." - da bi mu opet sa detinjom neiskvarenošću ostajalo srce obuhvatno kô Misisipi. Za sve one Južnjake koji su ga negde niz reku zagubili.

Ne propovedati u proširenju opsega satire, ne posipati katranom i perjem, a biti bolji!

I didn't enjoy this one as much as I enjoyed the Tom Sawyer book. I think because Tom was surrounded by his friends and the adventures were him and Huckleberry, this book is totally different, it's just Huckleberry and it just didn't flow as well for me. Or perhaps Toms adventures were so good that Huckleberry didn't live up to the challenge. Whatever the reason, it just didn't absorb me in quite the same way.

"Yes; en I's rich now, come to look at it. I owns mysef, en I's wuth eight hund'd dollars. I wish I had de money, I wouldn't want no mo'."

Though this book is might have the appearance of the second book to the Adventure's of Tom Sawyer, it is not at all similar. Tom Sawyer was a simple, fun-filled story covering a brief series of events where as this is a much heavier work in almost every aspect. Aside from having certain shared characters, reader will find no find other similarity.

However, what you will find, is the long, hard and adventurous journey of Huck and Jim, highlighting many aspects of a slavery and the social aspects at the time. If you start reading this, expecting a continuation to Tom Sawyer, you'd be pleasantly surprised instead of disappointed, giving you a very different kind of entertainment.

Un canto a la amistad, a la vida y a la libertad, así es como yo definiría Las aventuras de Huckleberry Finn, una de las mejores historias que he leído en mi vida.

En esta novela, narrada en primera persona por nuestro protagonista Huck Finn, seguiremos su historia a lo largo de un sinfín de aventuras que vivirá junto a un gran número de personajes que se encontrará en el camino.

Huck, cansado de que lo intenten civilizar, y de tener que soportar a su alcohólico padre —sin duda, uno de los peores padres que han existido en toda la literatura—, decide embarcarse a la aventura, yendo en una balsa por el río Mississippi. La cuestión es que no lo hará solo, sino que le acompañará Jim, un esclavo que ha decido fugarse para ir en busca de la libertad.

Honestamente, no puedo definir con palabras lo mucho que amé y disfruté esta novela, va más allá del hecho de que la narrativa es brillante y la historia un tanto más. Es quizá un caso particular en el que sé que se quedará conmigo para siempre, sin embargo, no sabría explicar los motivos. Quizá a más de uno le habrá pasado con alguna obra en particular y sabrá comprenderme.

Si bien hay algo que no me terminó de convencer del todo, un nuevo personaje que aparece casi al final del libro que hizo que la historia pasara de ser reflexiva y poética, a sentirse como si estuvieras leyendo un chiste, no demerita el hecho de que para mí esta sea una completa obra de arte. Le perdono este error a Mark Twain, quizá se vio obligado a introducir a dicho personaje o no sé; para fortuna de todos, el final es una completa joya y remonta como mínimo los peldaños que había perdido la historia.

Si tuviera que decir qué fue lo que más disfruté de la novela serían dos cosas: la primera, las sublimes reflexiones e importantes cuestionamientos que se hace Huck Finn a sí mismo, especialmente cuando tiene que actuar en contra de los principios que le han sido inculcados por la sociedad, y decide ir en contra de ello para hacer algo mejor, aquello que le dicta la conciencia, y por qué no decirlo, el corazón… bueno, si les digo que se me hacía un nudo en la garganta, es poco.

La segunda tiene nombre, y se trata de mi personaje favorito, y uno de los mejores personajes que me he encontrado en una novela: nuestro querido Jim. Pienso que es imposible no querer a Jim, especialmente por su personalidad y sus acciones, así como el hecho de contar con un amigo como él, sin duda cualquiera se habría sacado la lotería. Además, el que exista más humanidad en él que en muchos otros personajes, en un tiempo donde no era respetado como ser humano, es donde se nota (así como en muchos aspectos más) el poderoso mensaje que planea dar Mark Twain con esta obra. Simplemente maravilloso.

En conclusión, hay que leer Las aventuras de Huckleberry Finn al menos una vez en la vida, y tener en cuenta que además de ser una lectura ágil, es una lectura con una profundidad y un sentido muy bien definidos.

n  “¡Vete a liberarlo! No puede seguir siendo esclavo. ¡Tiene que ser libre como cualquier criatura que ande sobre la faz de la tierra!”n

P.S. No está de más recomendar esta edición que leí de la editorial Sexto Piso; no solo me pareció una buena traducción, sino que además las ilustraciones de Pablo Auladell hacen un increíble juego con la historia y le dan el toque final.
Que por cierto, Guille, si alguna vez lees esto, muchas gracias por convencerme de que este ilustrador hacía un estupendo trabajo, ha valido completamente la pena.

What a fresh narrative voice, I never would have expected that for a 19th century novel! And the level of adventure is right up there with any modern YA book.
I go a good deal on instinct - No sh*t, Huckleberry

With a protagonist named after a fruit that cannot be successfully domesticated, this classic gives us an especially irreverent 14 year old. Huckleberry flees an abusive and drunk father, just when he started to settle into a life of school and being less influenced by his youthful friends. He ends up faking his own death and navigating the Mississippi together with Jim, an enslaved man that tries to escape being sold in New Orleans.
Many dead people, storms, mist, treasures and con artists (who go by the name Duke and Dauphin and have everyone bowing to them) are encountered along the river, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn delivers on its title! Huckleberry even needs to dress up as a girl (like Achilles) to get information.
Along the journey the prejudices he has against black people start to be questioned and waiver due to the friendship and shared hardship experienced with Jim.

In terms of language I was a bit annoyed with so many by and by and the use of the word ornery (not to mention the continual use of the N word), but it is a feat this book remains remarkably readable after more than 100 years. The surroundings of Huckleberry and Jim are full of guns, barter trade and bounties to turn in free freed enslaved people. People project a lot on the travellers, with blabbering being their worst enemy in terms of getting exploited (Ain’t we got all the fools in town on our side, and ain’t that a big enough majority in any town?).
Circus and steamboat postal services serve as the limited connections to the outside world.

There is definitely humor in the book. For instance Huck his father, a no good drunk, ranting against the government, reminded me enormously of current day conspiracy theorists. Huckleberry his poor schooling also leads to Henry VIII being rendered as responsible for the Boston Tea Party and being the son of the Duke of Wellington. Shakespeare is butchered by some con artists in the most terrible enactment of Hamlet ever.

The section with Huck and Tom working on undoing Jim’s imprisonment near the end is rather confusing and less engaging, and severely convoluted, with Tom Sawyer his plans making me tired just reading about them. Also Jim his plight is not really covered much, which is a shame and renders him rather stereotypically, besides some observations like: Human beings can be awful cruel to each other