Individuality In Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn

Mark Twain wrote an important example of maintaining one’s individuality in a society that does not accept it: Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Growing up in the Southern United States, Twain lived with racism and slavery. He wanted to portray these inequalities which poisoned the country through the stories of a young boy in his novel, Huck. Despite the incredible controversy over his portrayal, Twain’s main character contradicted his own essay “United States of Lyncherdom” which illustrated the human instinct to fear being “pointed at, shunned, as being on the unpopular side” (Twain). As Huck confronted this instinct of others, he was able to do something most of us couldn’t - get over the selfish concern of fitting in to help someone in

First of all, when Huck first discovered Jim, he acknowledged “people would call [him] a low down Abolitionist and despise [him] for keeping mum” (Twain 32). Knowing the rest of his community would despise him created an inner argument in his head. Huck grew up without the luxury of a family and home to learn the manners and habits of a normal lifestyle. But the question is whether it really is a luxury or “normal”. He began to understand the distinction between his own rights and wrongs on his own and questioned “the use you learning to do right, when it’s troublesome to do right and aint no trouble to do wrong” (69). I believe one can decipher their own values, even if everyone thinks differently. Huck negated the public by feeling a dedication to his own beliefs and deciding his own morals. To emphasize the anxiety of living as an outsider in the community, Colonel Sherburn yelled, “Why don’t your juries hang murderers? Because they’re afraid the man’s friends will shoot them in the back, in the dark” (110). Nobody wants to be the one disagreeing with everyone else for the reason it puts a target on their back as the odd one out. Sherburn shed light on the fact that society tends to hide from a wolf of fear to appear sheep-like and conform to the “safety” and “protection” of the