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Examples Of Regionalism In Huckleberry Finn

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Regionalism in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn In his novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain creates the narrator Huck as a realist character. Huck’s tendencies toward realism— a minute fidelity to the common course of ordinary life— cause him to be a concrete thinker, contrasting the romantic Southern lifestyle that he lives with. Although he understands Southern culture, Huck’s realist perspective leads him to resist the regional ideals of the romantic hero and the Southern gentleman. Huck contrasts his friend Tom Sawyer, a romantic hero with archetypal qualities of youth, innocence, intuition, and honor. This novel exemplifies regionalism: literature that highlights a specific geographic setting and the speech, manners, …show more content…

When he and Jim meet two men who claim to be a king and a duke, Huck recognizes the deception but chooses to not challenge it. He narrates, “It didn’t take me long to make up my mind that these liars warn’t no kings nor dukes at all, but just low-down humbugs and frauds. But I never said nothing, never let on; kept it to myself; it’s the best way; then you don’t have no quarrels, and don’t get into no trouble” (166). The king and the duke abuse their false titles to convey status. The ideas of the Southern gentleman and romantic hero date back to the aristocracy in medieval Europe. The king and the duke display the power of titles and sophistication in this time period, which translate to the American South. They earn respect because of their titles as a king and a duke. Although Huck recognizes that they are frauds, he chooses to accept it without conflict instead of challenging the culture. Twain shows us the consequences of Huck’s choice because the king and the duke create trouble and perform scams to get money. Huck narrates, “I never see anything so dis- gusting” (217), displaying his disapproval of the act that the men are putting on. Twain communicates that when Huck does not challenge his culture, he cannot be at peace with the

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752 Words | 4 Pages

 When he and Jim encounter the “Duke” and “King”.  Huck states that it “didn’t take me long to make up my mind that these liars warn’t no kings nor dukes at all” (127).   Both Huck and Jim can clearly tell that they are frauds, and for several chapters heed to their every whim just to keep the social balance and to not get beat up by them.     In the end of the book, Huck has reached his moral peak, and completely goes against what society tells him.

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1162 Words | 5 Pages

Twain illustrates the critical tone by including words and phrases such as cover up, n*gger, and people could tell. The phrase cover up and n*gger illustrate the fear Huck has which develops from the ideals of his society. Huck acknowledges that his Antebellum society thinks that harboring Jim is bad judgement on his behalf so he tries to hide Jim so no conflicts rise due to his race. People could tell is incorporated in the quote in order to illustrate that the thoughts and ideals of what others think does have some wright to it and that he is not in a position to fully take care of someone else, especially when that someone else is a runaway

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680 Words | 3 Pages

When they first discover the fake background of the duke, Huck and Jim “...bow, when [they speak] to him, and say ‘Your Grace’…one of [them] ought to wait on him at dinner… [they] done it.” Similarly, with the king, Jim and Huck “... [get] down on one knee to speak to him, and always [call] him ‘Your Majesty,’ and [wait] on him first at meals… Jim and [him]... doing this and that and t’other for him…” Upon first meeting the duke and king, and hearing their backstories, Huck believes and acts respectfully toward both men.

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He does not offer any easy solutions or hope for change, which does not give society much room for growth. Twain’s portrayal of some of the characters in the novel are often bleak and unfavorable. He shows how people use religion and social conventions to justify their mistreatments of others. For example, when Huck and Jim

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903 Words | 4 Pages

It especially bothers him that they do not try to understand other people’s perspectives. He observes, “They get down on a thing when they don’t know nothing about it” (Twain 2). The town harps on “sivilized” manners, but the people do not even understand his ways. In an effort to avoid conforming, Huck comes to his own conclusions. Likewise, critic Bennett Kravits observes that Huck hopes to avoid conflict “[by] setting out to construct a new world--one in which he will become an active self-fashioner rather than [a] passive participant…” (Kravits).

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440 Words | 2 Pages

Twain does his best to deal with the conflict between society and the individual. Huck does not want to abide by society’s laws and does not want to conform in Mark Twain’s, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Huck is forced to be civilized in the beginning, so he leaves society for freedom and lives by his own rules but even that does not make Huck’s life easy. Huck has trouble obeying society’s rules from the start of the book. The Widow Douglas takes Huck in to try to sivilize him says Huck in the quote, “The Widow Douglas she took me for her son, and allowed she would sivilize me”(Twain 2).

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887 Words | 4 Pages

Mark Twain in the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, uses satire to mimic many of the characteristics of the modern world. Throughout the novel, Twain’s main characters, Huck and his black friend Jim, encounter many different situations and people throughout the entirety of the novel. Mark Twain designs and uses all of these hilarious situations to mock the American people and American lifestyle during the nineteenth century. Furthermore, these primary plot stories contribute to what he thinks are the three most egregious and irrational human behaviors practiced by the American people at this time. Twain satirizes the practice of slavery, the core nature of a human being to “go with the crowd” instead of thinking for itself, and lastly how desperate

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1768 Words | 8 Pages

Huck and Jim knew that the Duke and King were no good, but they did not want to ditch them at first because they were making them rich. On more than one occasion, Huck nearly compromised his personal values for what society deemed appropriate. For example, when Huck became overburdened by guilt because he was helping Jim escape, he almost turned Jim in even though he felt that it was wrong (161). After a moment of contemplation, Huck determines that his conscience would also make him feel just as bad if he went through with it because he had developed a friendship with Jim (162). Twain's depiction of Huck's constant, inner conflict between turning Jim in and helping him escape sheds light on how Huck's view of morality was changing.

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1361 Words | 6 Pages

For the duration of the novel, Twain illustrates hypocrisy in humans using the time period of the 1830’s and 1840’s. Racism is something that Huck observes

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1015 Words | 5 Pages

The Dauphin’s actions disgust Huck, who was previously blissfully unaware of society’s harsh and cruel nature. Huck, by ripping up his letter to Ms. Watson, and vowing to “steal Jim out of slavery again,” refuses to conform to the society and slavery (223). Huck’s non-conformist attitude conveys his progressiveness and emphasizes society’s archaic view on slavery. Thus, Huck’s experience with the Duke and Dauphin, shows him the cruel reality of slavery as well as the heartless reality of society. Before his experience on land, Huck remained conscious of, but not fully aware of heartless actions.

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1209 Words | 5 Pages

Tyler Perry’s For Colored Girls film is based on Ntozake Shange’s play, the self-described choreopoem “For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow Is Enuf.” In Perry’s film, there is a group of nine black women, most of whom live in the same Harlem apartment building, who all face personal crises, heartbreak and other challenges. Crystal faces an unhappy existence as an abused lover. Jo is a successful magazine editor, but her husband has a secret double life. Juanita is a relationship counselor, but cannot seem to get her love life in order.

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515 Words | 3 Pages

This quote shows that the Duke and King, who are notable antagonists of Huck’s journey, commit horrible acts that make Huck question the moral system. Twain shows this because it demonstrates how the moral system has failed to educate and drive its people to a path of virtue and honor. If the moral values were better in the 19th Century it is possible that Huck would not have had to meet such heinous people and instead be met with a more pleasant surprise. Some may say that even if the moral values were any different, the Duke and King would be terrible people. However, their harsh nature only piques the criticism of the moral failures of society and can not be

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1083 Words | 5 Pages

When the Duke and Dauphin first meet Huck, they claim that they are the Duke and Dauphin when it is blatant to Huck that they are merely impersonating the Duke and Dauphin. In response to this, Huck thinks “If I never larnt nothing else out of pap, I learnt that the best way to get along with his kind of people is to let them have their own way” (125). Huck displays a pre-conventional morality as he is basing his judgement off what Pap had told Huck. Despite Huck’s age and lack of education Huck still understands that although the Duke and the Dauphin are lying to him, it would be best to keep quiet. As Huck travels with the Duke and the Dauphin for a bit, they begin to go on many scams, pretending to be European royalty.

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939 Words | 4 Pages

To begin, Twain targets Huckleberry Finn's innocence and uses it as a way to show that anyone being raised in a racist, pro-slavery America was conflicted between morals and laws. At first, Huck is a "rebel" in his own mind, so to say, and tries to avoid becoming "sivilized" from the Widow Douglas. He sticks to what he knows, and uses his experience with people and his own judgment to make decisions like an adult, something quite

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597 Words | 3 Pages

At the beginning of the book Twain tells us that "In this book a number of dialects are used, to wit: the Missouri negro dialect, the extremist form of the backwoods South-Western dialects; the ordinary "Pike-Country" dialect; and four modified varieties of this last" (pg. 108). Twain guides us into the scene so we feel as if we are in the story. The grammar, sentence structure and words compose Huck's language and lets the us get a feel for his character and the customs of the region he comes from. The stories he describes throughout the book gives us an idea of the place he lives and travel’s in.

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