The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: What Was Twain's Purpose?
             For years, modern day critics have been tearing apart The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn inside and out; from its racial content, to issues about gender and sexuality, and most interestingly the ongoing controversy over the final chapters. The debate seems to diverge between whether or not Twain did it on purpose or if he just took an easy way out. The debate lies within how abrupt the ending came, how almost too elaborate it became, how Huck disappears and Tom reemerges, and just who takes the bowl of cherries for heroism. Taking a closer look at the literature itself and into Twain's mind, one can examine the ending as a "disappointment" or a "failed attempt to try", or one can view it as a "masterpiece".
             First, and foremost, the question at hand is: what happened? Twain, or Clemens, creates a masterpiece and seems to throw it away at the end. Or did he? From a personal standpoint, I cannot see so great of an author such as that of Mark Twain working so hard, and putting so much into the first thirty-one chapters, to only write an ending that so drastically changes the tone of the novel that he developed so carefully just to finish the novel. Many critics view the ending as unsatisfactory and unfulfilling to its theme.
             Throughout the novel, we watch Huck and Jim journey together along the Mississippi River, both in search of one thing: freedom, freedom from social constraint. As Marx says, "Huck and Jim seek freedom not from a burden of individual guilt and sin, but from social constraint."
             Together, Huck and Jim form their own society upon the raft. They both begin to grow; Huck maturing, Jim becoming more of a man. Then we are brought to this supposed "falling-off" of an ending in which Huck is shoved into the background. Tom resurfaces and seems to take over the rest of the novel, keeping Jim&apo...