Is Huck Finn Worth the Trouble?

November 18, 2011
by Kathryn Ward

Might as well say it straight:  Mark Twain was a contentious ol’ coot.  He lured people in with his book about the charming rascal, Tom Sawyer, and then delivered a below-the-belt hit with his follow-up about the kinder, but abused, Huck Finn.

Since the first moment of its publication, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn has drawn sharp criticism from many quarters and was (in fact, still is) one of the top targets for those who seek to protect the rest of us by banning books.  From that first moment, it has also drawn fierce affection.  I have loved Huck each time I have read it, from high school to graduate school and back to high school, now as a teacher; and I have never read it without being entertained, disturbed, angered, and uncomfortable in turn. 

Students respond variously to Huck.  The first response is usually a groan (“Why did he have to write Jim’s speech in dialect?  It’s too hard to read.”)  followed by discomfort which is triggered first by the use of what we can now only bring ourselves to call “the n-word.”  Many is the conversation that we have about why Twain would have used such an offensive word and our understanding of it has to grow from the easy explanation of “That’s how they talked back then” to the more difficult realization of “It was offensive then too, just as it is now.”  I am glad of their discomfort and grateful for the opportunity for us to discuss the power of words and how we can use them to hurt, to heal, to help. 

The issue we wrestle with, and which is necessary to answer if we want to justify continuing to read Huckleberry Finn, is whether it is worth reading a book into which Twain sprinkled this word so liberally. The power of that word to hurt, even across the 126 years since publication of the book, means that we have to handle this piece of literature with the same care we would take in handling a snake because it is imperative that we not harm those we seek to educate.  Frankly, Twain meant to offend us both with the word and with many of the moments in the book and, through that offense, inoculate us to keep us from continuing a lethargic, unrecognized prejudice that is as dangerous as overt, admitted prejudice. 

His efforts to offend us don’t stop with a bad word, but continue through many bad acts and attitudes dramatized in the book, some obvious and some camouflaged by the art of satire.  In sum, what we see is our “hero” Huck, growing from the outcast that society is trying to rescue and re-educate, to a young man who realizes that the only person who will love him for who he is, who will love him as only a parent can love his child, is Jim, the slave, the African, the ultimate outcast of the society; and this one real parent is the very parent he is not allowed to have.  The dirty word is no longer in Huck’s mouth, and at the end Huck flees the society which has tried to “sivilize” him by trying to make him replace his natural morality with the immorality of a state which sanctions slavery and of a church which turns a blind eye.  No wonder people in the immediately post-Civil War era were offended: no one escaped criticism.

Is it worth reading or teaching this book?  Its humor, both gentle and sharp, its violence, its prejudice, its gentle love argue that it is worth the effort. And then, its clear vision of the hypocrisy of society and the violence of the ugly thoughts are uncomfortable mirrors to much of what we still see.  By the end of the book, the alert reader has to admit that we – students, teachers, people of 21st century America – cannot be too smug about what happened “then” and “there,” but must be ever watchful because from the smoldering ashes, the flames still lick up occasionally, charring the “here” and “now.” 

Twain had no patience with smugness and willful inattention to reality.  He wrote to entertain, yes, but his additional subversive purpose was to enlighten.  I admire the crotchety ol’ coot and am grateful for the opportunity and the freedom to bring such a risky book into the classroom so that I can read it yet again with my students and learn with them and from them as they confront the darkness of prejudice and ignorance and the light that friendship and love can bring.

If you’ve been moved to take another look at Twain’s Huck Finn or have just read it for the first time, email me at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).  I’d be delighted to spend an evening with a group of interested readers looking at some of the caves and vistas of Huckleberry Finn.

Kathryn Ward has taught at Greeley since 1999, usually two English 9/10 classes, and two upper level electives, which change year to year. Some of the upper level electives she has taught are several different American literature courses, AP English, Writing and Communications, and Forces of Myth in Literature, among others.

CORRECTION:  When we first published this piece on Tuesday, the author was incorrectly identified in the by-line as “Christine Yeres.”  Sorry!