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For Discussion or Writing






1. Compare and contrast the development of Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn in their novels, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Who has changed more in the intervening time between the two novels? Why?

2. How accurate is the opening frame narrative when Huck speaks to his readers directly, claiming: “You don’t know about me, without you have read a book by the name of ‘The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, ’ but that ain’t no matter”?

3. In each of the stops that Huck makes along the river, he encounters new adventures that teach him about the civilization he ultimately rejects. How does each stop contribute to his final decision to “light out for the territory”?

4. Twain provides Huck with several role models: Pap, Jim, Tom, Miss Watson, the Widow Douglas, Judge Thatcher, the Duke and the Dauphin, the Grangers, the Wilkses, the Phelpses, and Aunt Polly. From which of the characters does he learn most about civilization and its expectations?

5. Superstitions play a large role in the development of the novel. Jim and Huck share a common interest in the folklore of their area, and both learn new myths from each other. Choose one example of folklore in the novel. Who tells us the superstition? Why is the superstition significant for the plot development? How does the superstition contribute to the overall development of a theme of the novel?

6. Racial inequality is not the only social inequity highlighted in the novel. Several references to gender differences are also made. How are girls Huck’s age portrayed? What accounts for the difference between men and women in the towns Huck and Jim visit?

7. Throughout the novel Huck assumes several different identities and encounters characters who are not who they claim to be. Why does Twain use such elaborate schemes? How does such a play with characters’ identities contribute to the development of the central theme of the novel?

8. Huck and Jim experience various truths, half truths, and outright untruths throughout the development of the novel. How does each character react to truth and lies? How do his experiences with truth and lies help him grow and develop during the course of the novel?

9. Much has been written on the idyllic island Huck and Jim share on the raft and the less than ideal world they encounter whenever they visit the riverbank communities. What makes the raft ideal? How does Twain represent Huck and Jim’s conduct on the raft as different from their behavior on shore?

10. The Duke and the Dauphin’s adaptations of Shakespeare’s plays overtly create literary allusions between the works cited and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Why are such literary allusions included by Twain? What role do they have in his darkly comic farce of society? What role do they play in furthering the discussion of the novel’s theme?

11. Twain’s novel is set in the Deep South during the years of 1835–45. Research the history of slavery in Missouri and Arkansas during this period. Is Jim’s experience an accurate representation of the life slaves endured? What has Twain fictionalized? Is such fictionalization necessary for the advancement of the novel’s theme? Does such a necessity make it appropriate?

12. Appended to his foreword to the novel, Twain adds a sentence warning his reader that “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.” Does Twain mean for his audience to take his advice seriously? What is the danger in taking his advice and not finding a motive, moral, or plot?

13. Like many of Twain’s works, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was carefully illustrated. How do the illustrations compare with the social commentary of the novel? Are the illustrations of Jim as sympathetic as his character development and his relationship with Huck reveal him to be?

14. Jim is not the only slave in Twain’s works. Closely read Aunt Rachel’s tale in “True Story.” How are Aunt Rachel and Jim alike and different? Does Twain’s fictionalized Jim do justice to the history and experiences captured in Aunt Rachel’s more-fact-than-fiction autobiography?

15. Adventures of Huckleberry Finn has been banned, removed from school and library shelves, censored, uncensored, added to or subtracted from required reading lists for all ages and in many different countries. Twain rather enjoyed the furor his novel caused. After reading the novel, write a letter to Twain and support your position on whether or not the book should be banned.






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