Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
All children have a special place, whether chosen by a conscious decision or not this is a place where one can go to sort their thoughts. Nature can often provide comfort by providing a nurturing surrounding where a child is forced to look within and choices can be made untainted by society. Mark Twain once said "Don't let school get in the way of your education." Twain states that this education which is provided by society, can actually hinder human growth and maturity. Although a formal education shouldn't be completely shunned, perhaps true life experience, in society and nature, are a key part of development. In the novel Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain throws the curious yet innocent mind of Huck Finn out into a very hypocritical, judgmental, and hostile world, yet Huck has one escape--the Mississippi River constantly flowing nearby. Here nature is presented as a thought provoking environment when experienced alone. The river is quiet and peaceful place where Huck can revert to examine any predicament he might find himself in: "They went off, and I got aboard the raft, feeling bad and low…Then I thought a minute, and says to myself, hold on,- s'pose you'd a done rig
"But I reckon I got to light out for the Territory ahead of the rest, because aunt Sally she's going to adopt me and sivilize me and I can't stand it. Huck has always thought of Tom as more intelligent than himself, but he cannot understand how Tom could toy with Jim's life in such a way. The natural flowing and calm of the river cause this deep-thought, show!ing how unnatural the collective thought of a society can be. After a long and thought-provoking adventure, Huck returns to the raft one final time to decide the fate of his friend. Twain tries here to tell the reader how strong the "mob" really is, and only when totally alone is Huck able to make the morally correct decision. The largest and most obvious test of Huck's character is his relationship with Jim. "The first time I catched up to Tom, private, I asked him what was his idea, time of the evasion?- what it was he planned to do if the evasion worked out all right and he managed to set a nigger free that was already free before? And he said, what he had planned in his head, from the start, if we got Jim out, all safe, was for us to run him down the river, on the raft, and have adventures plumb to the mouth…" (p. In the last few chapters, Tom Sawyer is re-introduced and the reader is left to examine how different environments: "sivilization" and nature (the river), have affected the children's growth. For much time, Huck is! without the river and it is though his mind clouds; he follows along with Tom playing a sick game until the end when he is once again threatened with being "sivilized". Through the child's eye we see how ignorant and mob-like we can all be. Only a few weeks with Jim and still feeling great ambivalence, Huck returns to the river to think. Although it might not be evident to himself, Huck causes the reader to see that "sivilization", in their treatment of blacks especially, is not civilized at all. Huck is at a point in his life where opinions are formed, and by growing on the river, Huck can stand back from society and form his own.
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