Essay, Research Paper
Mark
Mr. Lorber
Junior English-8
December 11, 2000
Changing Your Mind
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, is based on a young boy’s coming of age in
Missouri of the mid-1800s. The adventures Huck Finn works into while floating down
the Mississippi River can depict many serious issues that occur on the “dry land of
civilization” better known as society. As these somber events following the Civil War are
told through the young eyes of Huckleberry Finn, he unknowingly develops morally from
both the conforming and non-comforming influences surrounding him on his journey to
freedom.
Huck’s moral evolution begins before he ever sets foot on the raft down the
Mississippi. His mother is deceased, while his father customarily “sleeps with the pigs” in
a drunken state. Huck grows up following his own rules until he moves in with the
Widow Douglas and her sister, Miss Watson. Together, the women attempt to “sivilize”
Huck by making him attend school, study religion, and act in a way the women find
socially acceptable. However, Huck’s free-spirited soul keeps him from joining the
constraining and lonely life the two women have in store for him.
It is after Huck Finn escapes to Jackson Island that he meets the most influential
character of the novel, Jim. Huck’s conscience reminds him that he is a “low-down and
dirty abolitionist” for helping Jim run away from his owner, but Huck does not see that he
is on the same path for freedom like Jim. A morality check comes across Huck, as he
stumbles onto the criminals on the steamboat. Huck shows development of character by
tricking the watchman into going back to the boat to save the robbers. Even though they
are thieves, and plan to to committ murder, Huck still feels that their deaths would be too
great of a punishment. Some may see Huck’s reaction as crooked, but, unlike most of
society, Huck Finn sees the good in people and attempts to help them with sincerity and
compassion.
The con-men’s attempt to ma
important part of Huck’s development. The Duke and King try to take Peter’s estate,
however, Huck decides to return the money to Peter’s three daughters. This action
demonstrates further moral growth, as he does choose to abandon the two con-men. Huck
also learns how contriving people can be while attending the funeral of Peter Wilks.
Women would walk up to Peter’s daughters and “kiss their foreheads, and then put their
hand on their head, and looked up towards the sky, with the tears running down, and then
busted out and went off sobbing and swabbing, and give the next woman a show (159).”
Huck has never seen anything “so disgusting.” When Huck Finn sees one of the daughters
crying beside the coffin, it makes a deep impact on him. Not only did he experience his
first bout with puppy love, he also feels compassion for an innocent victim. His religious beliefs
and moral standards cross pathes as he handles the situation. When Huck says, “All right then,
I’ll go to hell! (245),” it represents the highest point in Huck’s moral development. He has
decided to go against his conscience by freeing Jim, and in doing so, rejecting society. While the
society he has grown up in teaches that freeing slaves is wrong, Huck has evolved to a point
where he can realize that what he feels is right, and that his own beliefs are superior to those of
Southern civilization.
Through several important events, Huckleberry Finn was able to raise above the rest of
society. As a young boy, he learned many things about the cruel world, and what freedom really
means. Along with other new emotions, Huck Finn has learned what it is like to show
compassion and sincerity to others. As a result, the metamorphisis of Huck Finn?s morality
shows how one go undergo being ?sivilized? even though the deny to learn the process. Society
has come a long way since the Civil War, and it is important to realize that characters like
Huckleberry Finn, have made freedom accessible to all that need a harbor from the dry limits of
society.