The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is a wild and winding tale of a thirteen-year-old boy written by Mark Twain. After escaping the grasp of his abusive and alcoholic father, Huck meets up with one of his former slaves, Jim. He learns that Jim is attempting to travel north for freedom. With nowhere else to go and nothing better to do, Finn joins him and alas, their adventures begin. Although the story seems innocent and simple from the outside, there are many hidden messages conveyed through Twain 's writing. These mainly come in the form of criticisms via humor. All in all, the social institutions of slavery, religion, and the "real south" are poked fun at in a satirical manner.
One belief that Twain subjects to ridicule is religion. He specifically targets the religion of Miss Watson and the civilized characters of the book. Through Huckleberry, Twain makes fun of the benefits and morals of religion. One way he does this is by humorously questioning the prayer system. Huck …show more content…
Although the story takes place before it, the novel was written after the Civil War, so slavery was abolished. However, it was still a time of strong racial prejudice. During the novel, Twain uses humor to criticize how stupid slavery was. One way he does this is through Jim and Huck 's parallel runaways. When Huckleberry Finn runs away from his father 's imprisonment, and fakes his murder, the entire town is after Pap and blames the incident on him. When Jim runs away from his imprisonment, the entire town is after him. Both of these escapes happen at roughly the same time, and can be seen as parallels. The difference is that they hunt Jim for running away because he is black, and hunt the man who made Huck run away because he is white. Once the reader looks into this idea, it is pretty funny, and the critique of slavery is clear, making this example of satire
One belief that Twain subjects to ridicule is religion. He specifically targets the religion of Miss Watson and the civilized characters of the book. Through Huckleberry, Twain makes fun of the benefits and morals of religion. One way he does this is by humorously questioning the prayer system. Huck …show more content…
Although the story takes place before it, the novel was written after the Civil War, so slavery was abolished. However, it was still a time of strong racial prejudice. During the novel, Twain uses humor to criticize how stupid slavery was. One way he does this is through Jim and Huck 's parallel runaways. When Huckleberry Finn runs away from his father 's imprisonment, and fakes his murder, the entire town is after Pap and blames the incident on him. When Jim runs away from his imprisonment, the entire town is after him. Both of these escapes happen at roughly the same time, and can be seen as parallels. The difference is that they hunt Jim for running away because he is black, and hunt the man who made Huck run away because he is white. Once the reader looks into this idea, it is pretty funny, and the critique of slavery is clear, making this example of satire