Huckleberry Finn Satire

Mark Twain - Racist or Rebel?

Satire is defined as “a literary work holding up human vices and follies to ridicule or scorn”(Merriam-Webster) and occurs particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues. Mark Twain, a master of satire and author of several satirical literary works, uses satire in Adventures of Huckleberry Finn to critique the ethics of the south during the slave era. In Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Mark Twain uses the narration of the main character, Huckleberry Finn, to depict the racism of the time and how hypocritical it was. This is done by the repetitive use of racial slurs as well as stereotypes to accurately show the vulgarity and vileness of slavery. Although Mark Twain also mocks families

Twain often focuses on the hypocrisy of the "good Christians." this is most readily apparent toward the end of the novel as the king easily deceives the religious crowd of mourners in Chapter 20. After the preacher cries out “Oh, come to the mourners’ bench! come, black with sin! (AMEN!) come, sick and sore! (AMEN!) come, lame and halt and blind! (AMEN!) come, pore and needy, sunk in shame! (A-A-MEN!) come, all that’s worn and soiled and suffering! – come with a broken spirit! come with a contrite heart! come in your rags and sin and dirt! the waters that cleanse is free, the door of heaven stands open – oh, enter in and be at rest! (A-A-MEN! GLORY, GLORY HALLELUJAH!).” With irony, the king asks the preacher if he can be allowed to speak. He then fabricates a story of how he has been a pirate, but now a changed man due to a preacher in a tent in Pokeville, even going as far as to describe him as "the truest friend a pirate ever had!" The king then feigns tears, and "so did everybody." The easily swayed crowd cries. Then a member of the mourners says "sings out,'Take up a collection!'" And, this is followed by another member who rallies others with "Let him pass the hat around!" Thus, in this instance, Twain mocks the blundering and religious fools that are so easily swayed and deceived by one of the greatest charlatans of the novel. While Twain has used satire to

Twain believed that slavery and religion were tied together, and thus making the abolition of slavery a difficult task. Twain repeatedly described religion's support for slavery; as stated in Twain’s autobiography ''The local pulpit taught us that God approved it, that it was a holy thing, and that the doubter need only look in the Bible if he wished to settle his mind and then the texts were read aloud to us to make the matter sure; if the slaves themselves had an aversion to slavery, they were wise and said nothing.'' this shows the churches justification for the horrendous act that was slavery. Twain believed there was a definite conflict between the actions of society and what society should have been doing in regard to slavery. He used his novel, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, to magnify the horrors and hypocrisy of the institution of slavery. In the novel, Twain depicts the contradictions ingrained in the institution of slavery. This is seen in many instances of society, such as, slaveholders making money on the suffering of the human beings they “owned”. The slaveholders were unable and often unwilling to see that they were exploiting them, abusing them, and oppressing them because they believed that the slaves could not survive without them. The slaveholders thought they were,in effect, doing the slaves a favor by providing for