When Mark Twain wrote "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" he received harsh criticism. His book was banned in many libraries Mostly everyone from his time period believed his literature was demeaning to their culture and country. The most reasonable idea might be that Huckleberry Finn, one of the main characters in the book, displayed the same values, ideas and controversial life that modern society had. And maybe that’s why they saw the characters as obscene and ridiculous. Twain directly examined people's beliefs about slavery and made a witty but fun satire of society when writing "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn."
The novel consists of many controversial characters whose ideas collide and change trough out the book. The main character in the book is Huckleberry Finn, who is only thirteen and has been raised by his alcoholic dad because his mother has deceased. We soon start to see that Huck is street smart and has never been educated, or perhaps his dad doesn't want him to be educated. His father, knows as Pap, kidnaps him, and takes him away from Ms. Watson who at the time had been his guardian. Ms. Watson teaches Huck mannerism, but Huck hates wearing decent clothing and hates the fact of being civilized.
Huckleberry Finn is an interesting character, even though he is young and tries to act like his old friend Tom; he also matures and breaks away from society's perspective. He became friends with Jim, one of Ms. Watson's slaves. Jim is much older than Huck, but they both have an intertwining relationship when Jim escapes from Ms. Watson in order to prevent being separated from his family, and hopefully arrive to the free states. Jim has a very familiar situation, because many slaves would also want to escape slavery, even when they have to sacrifice their family. At first Huck doesn't even realized that Jim is as much human as he is, and doubts that he loves his family as much as white people do. It’s hard to believe that a thirteen year old boy has ideas like this, and worst of all, Huck wanted to return Jim to Ms. Watson, who Huck believes "is his rightful owner." When Jim and Huck started traveling the Mississippi River, Huck sees their situation as an opportunity to have an adventure, just like the ones he experienced with Tom. But Jim, knowing that some decisions Huck was makes are completely risky and foolish, he doesn't want to question Huck’s authority because he knows, Huck could turn him in to the authorities anytime. Again we see the fear, slaves felt towards the power and authority of the white male, even when it refers to a thirteen year old boy.
I would say that Huck started to understand his society when he started meeting more characters in the book. The further they go the more grotesque situations they would find. The actions from the Duke and Dauphin, gave him an idea that his society was terrible to the extent that blacks had to run away from their families in order to reach freedom, and humans had such nature to bring one another down in a greedy and selfish way. The cruelty, in which people were living, made him question, right from wrong. This is where he questions what would be the right thing to do. Turn in Jim, a run away slave, something Huck's society consider the right thing, or follow his emotions, which were in favor of helping Jim. Huck sympathizes with Jim, when Jim tells Huck "he is the only white person that has kept his word." And so he does, after a long analysis, he realizes that Jim, a slave, was as much or even more human than whites.
Towards the end, the reader is finally convinced that Jim has been the good soul all along. He believed in Huck, an adventurous kid, he also protected Huck from harms way. He didn't allow Huck to see his father’s dead body because he knew it would hurt Huck, and wanted to avoid this horrific moment. And when he is freed by Tom and Huck, Tom gets wounded by a bullet; he takes care of him and assists the doctor in order to save Tom's life. To connect Mark Twain’s society to the book, he tells the readers that Ms. Watson, who has passed way, has freed all her slaves.
Huckleberry has grown and matured trough the novel, he broke away from the society he had been structured from, and has found his own belief, making an individual we didn't know before. Jim, in my opinion, has been the hero, for providing his humble as a reason to change Huck's life. Now I understand why many people from the 1860's found this as obscene. They were offended when being compared to Jim, who was the only character to show a moral conscious.
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