Examples Of Satire In Huckleberry Finn

Satire in “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn”

It is hard to fathom how such a serious lesson can be taught by using satire. Somehow Mark Twain accomplishes this through his novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. The main characters in the novel are a runaway boy named Huckleberry Finn and a runaway slave named Jim. In the story, Huckleberry Finn is mostly referred to as “Huck.” The story is about Huck Finn who fakes his own death and runs away from home because of an abusive father. To escape his father, he floats down the Mississippi River. Shortly after starting his voyage, he picks up a runaway slave. The two experience many trials throughout their journey. As Huck slowly distinguishes between right and wrong, he is faced with choosing

Before the novel begins, Twain sneaks “PERSONS attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot,” in. This quote foreshadows the humor that is yet to come. In chapter 18, two families are having a feud that people see as stupid, and Twain makes fun of them by pointing out when the men were going to church, “They kept them (guns) between their knees or stood them handy against the wall.” This is making fun of the feud because even at a place that is so sacred and holy the men still brought their guns. By its very definition satire is the ridicule of human vices and foibles, and this Twain provides in abundance. By doing so Twain is able to lighten the tone of the book that might otherwise come across as heavy or didactic. As a result this book that could bore a person with such a morals-heavy lesson instead provides

An example of such occurs throughout the story with belief that Huck is helping Jim when Jim is in fact helping Huck more than Huck is helping Jim. This is ironic because throughout the journey Huck thinks that he is helping Jim to become a free person, but in all reality, Huck would not have made it very far at all without Jim. This adds to the lesson of the story by showing the ignorance of racism. This shows that the idea of white superiority had been pushed on Huck, as a result, he genuinely thought he was helping just because he was white. Lacking the concept of racial equality, Huck did not realize how much he needed Jim. Another example of irony is “‘How is servants treated in England? Do they treat ‘em better ‘n we treat our n******?’ ‘No! A servant ain’t nobody there. They treat them worse than dogs.’” During this period, people did treat slaves worse than dogs. This also ties into the lesson of the book by showing ignorance. The people of the south thought it was morally acceptable and, perhaps, even a moral obligation to own slaves. Twain shows how people in the story cultural beliefs made blind to morality. “The minute he was on, the horse begun to rip and tear and jump and cavort around, with two circus men hanging on to his bridle trying to hold him, and the drunk man hanging on to his neck, and his heels flying in the air every jump, and the whole crowd of people standing up