Twain's novel The ADVENTURES of HUCKLEBERRY FINN is one of the most iconic books of the 20th C. Having read the novel as a young teen, I was swept away by the odyssey of Huck and Jim on the MI river and taken with the friendship between Huck, a young white boy and Jim, a Blackman living as a slave. As much as I admired Huck for befriending Jim and abetting him as a runaway despite being raised to view blacks as subhuman, unworthy of compassion, the gravitas of Huck's rejection of these vile norms and his courageous rejections of them didn't strike me with as much pain as being witness to Jim's agony through his eyes, mind and conversations with Huck. Jim's humanity bellows in anguish and resounds with dignity as he attempts a harrowing escape north looking out for himself and Huck who's fleeing an abusive father. This book deals a with Jim's abilities to read, write and speak in a dialect that aligns with the grammar and elocution of whites. The burden of illiteracy and speech denoted inferior, is a form of subjection that perpetuates enslavement. The inner strength and moral certitude of Jim comes through his selfless acts and conversations with Huck who looked to him for comfort and guidance. Hucks asks Jim, "How I s'posed to know what good is. Way I sees it is dis. If'n ya gots to hat a rule to tells ya what's good, if'n ya gots to hat good 'sprained to ya, den ya cain't be good. If'n ya need sum kinda God to tells ya right from wrong, den you won't never know." Attention is focused on literacy as it signifies freedom. Jim realizes, "The power of reading made itself clear and real to me. If I could see the words, then no one could control what I got from them. It was a completely private affair and completely free and, therefore, completely subversive." Jim was met with bafflement from those, including Huck and fellow slaves in regards to his non-slave talk and his literacy skills. One of the many poignant and deeply disturbing experiences involves another slave George who aided Jim in risking his life to swipe a pencil stub he asked for. George beseeches Jim to write his own life story, understanding how oppression is maintained by keeping slaves illiterate. The sovereignty embedded in writing is also the power to record history and dispense knowledge. Everett's novel works as a daring odyssey of survival against all barriers. The most egregious obstacle is systemic racial hatred and the barbaric of human slaves. Huck's dawning realizations and Jim's convictions provide simple truths without preaching by reaching deep into one's soul. "How kin one person own another person? Dat be a good question, Huck." Jim considers "A man who refused to own slaves but was not opposed to others owning slaves was still a slaver, to my thinking." And, Jim's assessment of evil did not apply to whites only. "Bad as whites were, they had no monopoly on duplicity, dishonesty or perfidy." Twain's "HUCK FINN" stands as a classic tale and testament to the horrors of slavery woven into an adventure experienced within a coming of age novel. JAMES expounds on this tale in a broader and more honest manner. I strongly urge reading both great literary works as testaments to the scope of humankind's attributes, from the most divine to the most sinister.
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