In an excerpt from Mark Twain’s Adventures of Tom Sawyer called White-washing the Fence, Tom is forced by his Aunt Polly to white-wash her front fence. Instead of letting free boys like Ben denigrate him, Tom convinces them that white-washing is a privilege and exploits their foolishness to coerce them into doing his work for him, and having them pay him for him letting them work. While Tom and Ben are separated by levels of maturity, both are competitive. However, Tom is cunning and manipulative while Ben is far too credulous. Notably, both Tom and Ben are competitive. They both want to do things that are "cool" or fun, and not do things that aren't fun or "cool". This can be seen through Tom's thoughts (though it appears in the story itself
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There is no doubt Tom is a lot more mature than Ben. Instead of walking down the street like a normal person, Ben skips down the street impersonating a steamboat: “He was eating an apple, and giving a long, melodious whoop, at intervals, followed by a deep-toned ding-dong-dong, ding-dong-dong, for he was personating a steamboat. As he drew near, he slackened speed, took the middle of the street, leaned far over to star-board and rounded to ponderously and with laborious pomp and circumstance—for he was boat and captain and engine-bells combined, so he had to imagine himself standing on his own hurricane-deck giving out orders and executing them:”(Twain 1) No mature person would skip down the side walk saying ding-dong-dong every so often and things like “Stop her sir! Ting-a-ling-ling!”(Twain 1) On the other hand, Tom is far more mature. He completely ignores Ben’s nonsense and focuses on …show more content…
When the boys see Tom white-washing and make fun of him, Tom manipulates them into thinking his work is a privilege: “ ‘Like it? Well, I oughtn’t not to like it. Does a boy get a chance to whitewash a fence every day?’ That put the thing in a new light. Ben stopped nibbling his apple. Tom swept his brush daintily back and forth –stepped back to note the effect—added a touch here and there—criticized the effect again—Ben watching every move was getting more and more interested, more and more absorbed. Presently he said: ‘Say, Tom, let me whitewash a little.’ ”(Twain 2) Does not being able to wash dishes everyday make dish washing a privilege? No, but if someone gullible (like Ben) was told it was a privilege because not everyone gets to do it every day would probably believe it. Tom is obviously manipulative to be able to convince people to do his work and pay him. It was clever enough to get people to do his work, but the fact that he got people to pay him just further proves that Tom is
There is no doubt Tom is a lot more mature than Ben. Instead of walking down the street like a normal person, Ben skips down the street impersonating a steamboat: “He was eating an apple, and giving a long, melodious whoop, at intervals, followed by a deep-toned ding-dong-dong, ding-dong-dong, for he was personating a steamboat. As he drew near, he slackened speed, took the middle of the street, leaned far over to star-board and rounded to ponderously and with laborious pomp and circumstance—for he was boat and captain and engine-bells combined, so he had to imagine himself standing on his own hurricane-deck giving out orders and executing them:”(Twain 1) No mature person would skip down the side walk saying ding-dong-dong every so often and things like “Stop her sir! Ting-a-ling-ling!”(Twain 1) On the other hand, Tom is far more mature. He completely ignores Ben’s nonsense and focuses on …show more content…
When the boys see Tom white-washing and make fun of him, Tom manipulates them into thinking his work is a privilege: “ ‘Like it? Well, I oughtn’t not to like it. Does a boy get a chance to whitewash a fence every day?’ That put the thing in a new light. Ben stopped nibbling his apple. Tom swept his brush daintily back and forth –stepped back to note the effect—added a touch here and there—criticized the effect again—Ben watching every move was getting more and more interested, more and more absorbed. Presently he said: ‘Say, Tom, let me whitewash a little.’ ”(Twain 2) Does not being able to wash dishes everyday make dish washing a privilege? No, but if someone gullible (like Ben) was told it was a privilege because not everyone gets to do it every day would probably believe it. Tom is obviously manipulative to be able to convince people to do his work and pay him. It was clever enough to get people to do his work, but the fact that he got people to pay him just further proves that Tom is