Huck Finn Blog Post 3

When Huck and Jim are seperated in a raft incident, Huck ends up staying with the Grangerfords. A different and unique family that is feuding with Shepherdsons. Huck stay with them is quite interesting compared to anything else he has done. When it comes to the Grangerfords, Twain isn't very subtle at all the different elements he uses when describing Huck's stay with them. The different types of humor, allusion and saddness were clearly shown in this part of Huck's adventure.
Saddness was used by Twain in an interesting way during this part of the story. When we start to get to know the family of the Grangerfords, one of the first people mentioned in the family was Emmeline. Emmeline was fourteen when she died of a disease and long before Huck even met the family. Her love for the arts and death is hard to go unnoticed though. Her paintings of melancholy scenes, somber poems and collection of obituaries creates a more depressing and saddening scene for the readers. Then later in the story, Buck dies during a battle between the Grangerfords and Shepherdsons, Huck saddness because of the loss of his friend is present. Showing a hard life that Huck has and how he is saddened by the loss of his new friend. "I cried a little when I covered up Buck's face, for he was a mighty good friend to me" (Twain, 117). Huck's encounter with the Grangerfords has given him a different experience on his adventure. Giving Huck a expierence with saddness and the feeling of loss and he runs away with Jim.
When it comes to the feud between the Grangerfords and the Shepherdsons, it gives the allusion of the feud in the famous British play, Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare. The constant battle and anger towards one another is constantly brought up by the Grangerfords. Their feud that happened years ago and no one really knows why it even started. "Oh, yes, pa knows, I reckon, and some of the other old people; but they don't know now what the row was about in the first place" (Twain, 110). The love between a Grangerford's daughter and Shepherdson's son is powerful enough for them to run away together. It feels very similar to the tradgic story of Romeo and Juliet and their constantly feuding family. This gives the sense of allusion when Huck goes to visit the Grangerfords and lives with them.
Then their was humor. Humor is used when it comes Huck talking about the Grangerford's way of living. How different they are when it comes to living their lives and the different decorations thoughout the house were compared to what he was accustomed to. When he sees the melancholy scenes that Emmeline painted, he didn't see the beauty or reasoning behind the art work. " These was nice pieces, I reckon, but I didn't somehow seem to take to them, beecause if ever I was down a little they always give the fantods" (Twain, 104). Twain was making fun of the unique and depressing way of thinking and the wierd love of death Emmeline has. Later they go to discusss the feud that the families are undergoing. Twain was making fun of how the family was in a feud with the Shepherdsons and they had no idea why. Humore was used throught the scene to show how different and wierd the Grangerfords way of living was. How some of the things they did were really different and kinda crazy. To show how some of the things people do just seem stupid to others. Humor played a major role in this part of Huck's adventure.
Twain used humor, saddness and allusion to get some points across during the story and to give Huck's adventure a little twist when he goes to visit the Grangerfords. Hucks adventure to their home has created a diifferent feeling to the story by the different elements Twain used. Making them crucial to this part of the story.

Blog Post 2- Father and Son: Huck and Jim

Huck and Jim have created a unique relationship over the short time together they have spent together on the run. A relationship, that could be discribed best as a father-son relationship between the two. Jim seems more as the son in this relationship though. He is very protective of Huck and wants to take care of him all the time. "I reck'n he's been dead two er three days. Come in, Huck, but doan' look at his face-it's too" (Twain, 56). Jim also has a lot to learn though. Huck has much to teach him and has helped him out in many ways. And even though Jim may be older, there are things that his education that he didn't cover that Huck can teach him. Jim does care for Huck and he can learn so much more from him, making him like a son to Huck.
Huck also started playing the role in this relationship as well. He has become similar to a father to Jim. Huck feeds Jim when he finds him in the woods, helps him with shelter and everything else they need on their escape. Huck was also truly worried when he went to the house and Judith Loftus told them about her husband's expedition to the island to find Huck and Jim. "I got so uneasy, I couldn't sit still. I had to do something with my hands; so I took up a needle off the table and went to threading it" (Twain, 64). Huck is even obligated by the law to turn Jim into the athorities. He even could sell Jim off on the slave market, but doesn't because of their relationship and his care for him. Huck starts to teach Jim alot and helps him out termendously along the way. Huck seems alot like father to Jim because of it.
Huck and Jim share their stories all the time and teach each other new things. Huck and Jim have grown to care for one another to an extent. They are closer than ever and seem like a father and a son. Even if their roles seem backwards.

Impression of Huck Finn

              In the first ten chapters of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain has perceived Huck as an independent kind of person. Huck isn’t one to follow the rules and ways of those around him. He doesn’t always fit in with the rest of the white community of pre- Civil War, Mississippi. He has his own ways of living his life that don’t always match up to those around him, even his best friend, Tom Sawyer. Huck even explains within the first chapter that he left Miss. Watson because he didn’t like her ways of living. “… but it was rough living in the house all the time, considering how dismal regular and decent the widow was in all her ways; and so when I couldn’t stand it no longer I lit out” (Twain, 11). Huck never seemed to need anyone to help him out. Even when he decided to run away from his father, he had it all planned out to live his life on his own: to live in solitude where no one could find him and have nothing, but the woods and him to keep company “I thought it all over, and I reckoned that I would walk off with the gun and some lines, and take the woods when I ran away. I guess I wouldn’t stay in one place, but tramp across the country, mostly nighttimes, and hunt and fish to keep alive…” (Twain, 34). Huck is one to take care of himself and live his own way. He doesn’t need anyone to tell him what to do or how to live his life. Huck is an independent human being.

            Along with being independent, Huck is also lacks self-confidence. When people call him names or beat him, he just takes it. He may get a little upset about it, but he never really does anything about it. When Tom Sawyer created his gang, a kid blatantly pointed out how Huck has no family. Huck didn’t try to defend himself for not having the family everyone else had. He just took the blow. “They talked it over, and they was going to rule me out… I was most ready to cry,” (Twain, 17). Later, after he ran away, he clearly showed that he didn’t think much of himself. “Jim said bees wouldn’t sting idiots; but I didn’t believe that, because I had tried them lots of times myself, and they wouldn’t sting me,” (Twain, 52). Huck has little confidence for himself. He doesn’t think he is smart and doesn’t really defend himself when being kicked around. He may have a hard exterior, but he doesn’t think much of himself in the end.

            In the first ten chapters of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain has perceived Huck as an interesting character and readers can already see what kind of person he will be in the story. While he may be perceived in different ways, readers can really see how Huck is independent, but lacks self-confidence.