Commentary on The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn :: essays research papers

This passage comes from the first chapter of The Adventures of huckabackleberry Finn, by Mark couple. huckleberry is explaining how life is with the Widow Douglas and put down Watson. He is describing one evening at his refreshful home in their company. This section serves to characterize the two ladies, to foreshadow some events that will happen later in the novel, to create a snappishness of death, to reinforce the theme of death and rebirth, and to characterize huckabackleberry. At the beginning of the passage, Huck describes Miss Watson as a deeply religious person. She talks somewhat the good place (3), as a reward for sivilized people. Twain satirizes religious belief when the widow says that all a body does in heaven is tactic the harp and blabber forever and ever (3). Indeed, why would she want to sing endlessly once she is dead? But because of Hucks unclouded heart, he didnt think much of it (3). All he wants is to be with Tom Sawyer. So even at the beginning of the story, Huck is already rejecting society because he does not care about going to heaven. In addition, Miss Watson is mean toward Huck. She keeps pecking (3) at him. The word pecking is very important in this passage because it compares Miss Watson as a bird that strikes with its beak. This comparison suggests that Miss Watson is a nag and that her constant criticism is painful to Huck. With the help of Hucks description, the reader can infer that the two ladies are civilise and educated, but surprisingly, when it comes to slaves, they lose all of their humanity and just fetched the niggers in and had prayers (3). They overlay them no better than they would treat animals. Their behavior toward slaves demonstrates how superficial and hypocritical they are.In addition, Mark Twain foreshadows death, which will happen later in the book. For example, when Huck goes up to his room, he feels lonesome (3), he wishes he were dead. In this passage, Twain emphasizes the theme of Huck s quest for freedom. Huck has a guide for liberty. Since he is stuck in a house he feels tiresome (3), and locked in. The root also uses many morbid words to foreshadow death, such as mournful, dead, crying, die, shivers, ghosts, grave and grieving (3). As a result, the death imagery and diction creates a dreadful mood.