Analysis of Huck Finn's Characters
In America/kloc-in the mid-9th century, Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter had the embryonic form of children's image works, but it was not until twenty or thirty years later that children first appeared as protagonists in American literature in Mark Twain's two adventure novels, The Adventures of Tom Aesop and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. It describes the decadent bourgeois lifestyle and the evil of slavery through the eyes of a 13-year-old child with the clue of children's adventure experience. The vivid and true social life scenes and humorous language style in the novel have won readers' love. Extraordinary ideological content and unique artistic creativity make this novel a masterpiece. So Hemingway said, "All modern American literature comes from one book, that is Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn ... which is the best of all our books. All American literature comes from this book, and there has never been a comparable work before or after it. "
Throughout the whole work, it is found that the image of children in it has very abrupt characteristics. In the process of reading the text, it is not difficult to find that Huck, as the protagonist of the novel, has a special literary image different from that of adults in other traditional literature, and has a characteristic that cannot be interpreted by adults-that is, his childlike innocence. He sees the world with fairy-tale eyes. When the world he saw when he opened his clear eyes was so different from the fairy tale world he had branded since he was a child, he would use his fairy tale heart to distinguish right from wrong and think ... until he found that the world was so chaotic, his exploration gradually turned into escape. Usually, he will reject the civilization of the adult world and yearn for the undeveloped nature as his escape direction. To some extent, his resistance transcends a line, which subtly becomes his resistance to the adult world. He also hopes to change the chaos and darkness of this world through his own resistance. This kind of attempt often collapses under the weight of the adult world, and is either assimilated or swallowed up. But this kind of exploration and resistance has never been broken, and it has been repeated in generations of children. Maybe one day, he will change the color of the world and let the world reflect the light that belongs to the sun. ...
Huck is at the end of adolescence (1~2 1) and is a special social group of this age. Traditionally, children are not regarded as full members of social groups, but as embryonic adults without personal identity and private property of their parents. In fact, they like to express their ideas with different expressions and intonations when learning English. Children have their own voice anytime and anywhere.
(A) the voice in fairy tales
First of all, the voice in fairy tales is always accompanied by children, and it is a voice that pursues truth, goodness and beauty and yearns for nature. It is not until children are assimilated into the adult world that fairy tales will be assimilated and become a realistic interpretation. The crisp children's voice will be covered by the ugly dumb voice ... Huck is no exception. He advocates nature. He thinks listening to this natural sound in the Woods is the most stable way to sleep. "Put on my old rags and hide in my big barrel full of sugar again, happy and satisfied." This is his subconscious favorite voice, this is the voice in fairy tales, this is the real and natural voice.
(2) Inner voice
Secondly, what kind of mood and sound does the persistent fairy tale sound make? This inner voice is the child's understanding attitude towards society and his desire for society. Huck, the son of an alcoholic, is often beaten by his alcoholic father. He is used to sleeping in nature. "When the weather is not too cold, I often sneak out and sleep in the Woods, which makes it easier to fall asleep." I like to eat rice in the slop bucket. "In the swill bucket is not the same. Everything is mixed together. The soup will taste better when it is mixed. " After the widow adopted him, although he began to accept some normal ways of life, he reluctantly accepted it. A life that emphasizes rules everywhere is a torment for him. In Huck's eyes, "every move should be disciplined, and that day never happened." When he really couldn't stand this sin, he slipped away, put on his old rags and went back to live in a big barrel filled with sugar. Huck yearns for a natural lifestyle and likes to explore. After Huck set up the illusion that he was killed, he began to look for his own space and met the black Jim. Under the education of law and orthodoxy at that time, he found that it was a sin for a black man who escaped not to report to his master's family. Huck almost reported Jim's escape several times in the process of constant suffering in his heart, but in the process of adventure, he discovered Jim's kindness and friendliness, and also discovered the so-called dirty, hypocritical and sinful civilization and upper-class world. In this process, Huck gradually matured. Huck's adventure is an unconscious exploration and the direction of his inner voice. His exploration is actually the process of pursuing freedom, getting close to nature and getting rid of the shackles of civilization under the guidance of his inner voice.
(3), trying to make a sound
Then when the inner voice accumulates to a certain extent, I always want this inner voice to come out, which is a process from exploration to resistance. Huck saw the life of various so-called civilized people on both sides of the strait in the process of adventure, and bodies often floated on the river; There are "Duke" and "King" liars everywhere; The old Peggy Lanchford family, who was born in the nobility, and the Shepardson family, who came from the south, fought over a trivial matter, and almost all of them died in a cruel struggle with each other ... All this was personally experienced by Huck during his journey. He looked at the evils of human society and contrasted Jim's faithfulness, kindness and sincere concern. After Jim and Huck separated, they looked for Huck anxiously, thinking that Huck had been washed away by the water, and began to cry. The woman who tried to catch Jim with $300 tried to catch the show because of the temptation of money, but she still had a gentle light and tolerated Huck's disguised as a man. All these make Huck feel the glimmer of "goodness" in human society. His idea of trying to help black Jim escape is the process of his decision through a kind of thinking about society, and it is also a decision from exploration to resistance. This is a manifestation of Huck's attempt to make his true inner voice.
(4) Silent protest
Finally, children's unconscious escape behavior, to a certain extent, is actually a way of their resistance. When they try to make their inner voice, their voice is very weak in the face of the voices of adults around the world, and they will subconsciously escape this silent protest as a sign of their resistance. In the process of silence, they hope to get out of this noisy adult world and make their own voices in a world of their own without interference. That place is not as natural as the adult world. On the way to this rebellion, children often express their protests in various ways to escape. No matter what their way is, because their attitude in society is too weak, they can only protest silently.
Huck can read the Bible every day under the guidance of the widow. Although he doesn't understand the meaning, he can't even figure out why he wants to go to heaven, as long as he can be with his good friend Tom. He prayed before and after meals, although he didn't believe that God could really realize people's wishes, at least God didn't realize his long-cherished wish to have a fishing rod. You can also read the story of General Washington and the war. I can also go to school, know a few words, and get a blue and yellow photo of a shepherd boy driving several cows because of my good study. However, Huck felt that his hands and feet were bound by new clothes. After his alcoholic father took him away, he lived on an island. He quickly adapted to this place and liked life there, except for the whip part. "I lie there comfortably every day smoking, fishing, not reading books, not doing homework, so I am lazy and happy to live. More than two months have passed, and my clothes are rotten ... I never want to go back. ..... On the whole, I had a wonderful time in the Woods. " Huck's consciousness is actually to escape the civilized education of adult society. Although he was forced to play truant by his alcoholic father, he was very happy.
Huck simply escaped civilized education, but he still couldn't escape the noise of adults. The bawling and flogging of the alcoholic father is also a kind of adult voice, which still masks Huck's true inner voice, so after careful planning, he escaped from the cabin without causing confrontation. This is also Huck's silent protest.
Huck wants to realize his heroic ideal through redemption. Jim, the slave Huck wants to save, is a pure man different from the civilized world and a class firmly denied by the so-called civilized white world at that time. This is his resistance to the so-called civilized adult world. But in the end, Huck saved Jim and found that Jim was no longer an escaped slave, but a free man.
At the end of the novel, Huck returns to this "civilized" society, but he yearns for life in the American West with all his heart. The imaginary west no longer exists, which is virtually equivalent to "despair". Even the natural land imagined by children has been civilized by adults.
Children's understanding of the adult world, that is, the defined civilized world, is analyzed from children's eyes. They tried to express something and change something with their weak strength, but in the end they just protested silently, which led to their despair. Children will also experience their age and become adults who suppress children in the next period. History repeats itself, which is actually caused by the whole human civilization. This kind of exploration and escape itself is accompanied by resistance, which often leaves a glimmer of hope for further exploration and escape while despair, because there will always be children in this world!