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Loading... Adventures of Huckleberry Finn [Norton Critical Edition, 2nd ed.] (1977)by Mark Twain, Richmond Croom Beatty (Editor), Sculley Bradley (Editor), Thomas Cooley (Editor), E. Hudson Long (Editor)
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. I read this book once every year. My favorite copy is a facsimile edition that was included with an anthology of American literature that I had to buy for a literature class. This Norton edition is good because it's the authoratative text. Illustrations are not included in my copy of the Norton edition--the reviewer who mentioned illustrations must be referring to a different edition. If political correctness is a big deal for you, then this book probably isn't for you. Lucky Mark Twain--he had to deal with a lot of different issues, but the PC Police wasn't wasn't one of them. I first read this book at about age 10 or 11 and loved it, so much so in fact that I can still recall hearing a particular song on the radio as I was reading a certain chapter for the first time. I've read it at least 10 times over the years and take away something new and different each time. It is clearly one of the greatest of American novels. no reviews | add a review
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The American classic is accompanied by critical studies by such scholars as Van Wyck Brooks, Lionel Trilling, and T.S. Eliot. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)813.4Literature English (North America) American fiction Later 19th Century 1861-1900LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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The flight from slave-hunters down the Mississippi is the destruction of this Eden, finalized by taking the Duke and the King onboard the raft.
I found Ralph Ellison and Judith Fetterley's essays most insightful in this Norton Critical Edition. Ellison connects the characterization of Jim to the minstrel show, and his friendship with Huck as an undermining of Black manhood. This is the primary scar, or flaw, in this text. Jim is a martyr; he is noble; but is he fully human in Twain's portrayal?
Fetterley's analysis of the Tom Sawyer episode at the end reveals Tom's malevolent egotism as a continuation of the King and the Duke, Miss Watson, and the general milieu of violent and primitive folks who live in small towns along the Mississippi. This river is not so dissimilar from Conrad's Congo - we are in a state of nature, where the concept of civilization resides in the power structure and those who are willing to use deceit or violence to attain power. ( )