Huck Finn Blog

"Aunt Sally she's going to adopt me and sivilize (sic) me, and I can't stand it"(Twain 283).

This quote displays just how far Huck has come. In the beginning of the novel, Huck would have given anything for a stable, loving home environment. Anything would have been better to him than living under his tyrannical father. However, as the story progresses, Twain provides Huck with life experiences that force him to grow up faster and question the society that he lives on the edge of. After his encounters with the injustice, feuds, frauds, and survival, Huck has come to see that society is not as great as he had assumed and that maybe he was better off when he lived his own life on the river. Twain is teaching us about societal stagnancy and its questionable principles. As society stayed the same, Huck changed morally and intellectually, in the end out growing commonly held values. Twain is trying to show the reader that it is not until one steps away from society that one can truly see the troubles within it. Also, it is not until one questions authority or common belief that the world can ever change. Through the innocent eyes of young Huck Finn, the reader can see a society in the most raw way; he is unburdened by the desire for money and success, making his views pure and unbiased. When one looks at themselves in society, one must consider if the ways of society are truly good and moral, or just made to seem that way. When one takes out of the equation the things that drive them everyday and in doing so, their justification of actions, they can see the world as Huck does. This is what Twain looks to provoke a reader of today's society with, the timeless message of stepping back and seeing where society is, as opposed to where it should be.