Theme: the theme of slavery in the novels of m. Twain contents

2.7.Slavery in the Novel

The novel was published in 1885, it aims at reflecting the darker side of the American society and the evil of slavery during the 19^th century. The book was set during the 1840‟s where slavery was not abolished, throughout the novel Twain speaks about families that owned slave in America (History.com).
Most of the themes portrayed in the novel are directly related to the issue of slavery such as: prejudice, racism, freedom and hypocrisy. The white people of this period in the south of America have many prejudices towards slaves. In his novel Mark Twain demonstrates to what extent this society is racist. This can be seen through many characters and the way they act towards blacks. The people of the towns are slave owners and they treat them with disrespect and they make them look like fools, for example when Tom and Huck trick the slave Jim and he thinks that he is bewitched. The fact that other slaves come from other part of the country to listen to his story is a kind of making fool of them “Niggers would come miles to hear Jim tell about it, and he was more looked up to than any nigger in that country” (Twain 6). Some characters even believe that the slaves belong to them as if they are a personal property and if they run towards their freedom, slave-owners would hire some people to bring back those slaves. As an example, in the novel, Miss Watson plans to sell Jim down the river “I hear old missus tell de widder she gwyne to sell me down to Orleans, but she didn‟ want to, but she could git eight hund‟d dollars for me” (Twain 45). This is the main cause why he runs away from her.
Pap is also a racist man, when he gets drunk one night he explains how the government is too wonderful as he speaks of a black man who could speaks many languages, the worst thing for Pap is that this person could vote in his town “but when they told me there was a State in this country where they‟d let that nigger vote, I drawed out. I says I‟ll never vote agin. Them‟s the very words I said; they all heard me; and the country may rot for all me—” (Twain 29). In this situation Twain shows us to what extent Pap is racist and he refuses voting if the government gives the right of voting to a black man while in reality it is more appropriate for an educated black man to vote than for drunken Pap. Another situation of racism when
Aunt Sally asks Huck if anyone get hurts he says “No‟m. Killed a nigger” (Twain
223). She replies: “Well, it‟s lucky; because sometimes people do get hurt”( Twain 223), as if when someone black dies it means nobody is getting hurt in this case slaves are not considered to be human.
Slavery is the main theme that Mark Twain focuses on in his novel through the character Jim who suffered from mistreatment and slavery. Even though Huck was raised in a society that supports slavery and as the novel progresses, one may notice that Huck‟s feelings towards the slave Jim start to change when he discovers that Jim has a family but due to slavery he is away from his wife and children. At the beginning of the novel Huck has some doubts to save Jim because of what people will say about him and due to what he learns from society about blacks and the prejudices he has about them as inferior. For example, when Huck wrote a letter to Miss Watson Jim‟s owner “I felt good and all washed clean of sin for the first time I had ever felt so in my life, and I knowed I could pray now” (Twain 216). In this situation Huck is confused between whether to tell Miss Watson about her slave and follow what society tells him to do or to follow his instinct and help Jim. Huck struggles with some prejudices about Blacks that society has ingrained in him and he challenges some traditional notions of the time.
Freedom is another important theme in the novel. It is shown into Jim being freed from slavery and his will to free his family member which is his goal in the novel “Jim won‟t ever forgit you, Huck; you‟s de bes‟ fren‟ Jim‟s ever had; en you‟s de only fren‟ ole Jim‟s got now” (Twain 92) when Jim sees the light of the free states he starts to thank Jim for helping him and he considers Huck as his best friend. Twain is blaming society for supporting slavery and giving slave owners the right to separate children wives from their families only for the sake of their benefits.
Even at the beginning of the novel a Judge of the town gives custody to Huck‟s abusive and drunken father even “it was a new judge that had just come, and he didn‟t know the old man; so, he said courts mustn‟t interfere and separate families if they could help it; said he‟d druther not take a child away from its father” (Twain 22). The fact that the Judge is new in the town he did not know about the bad treatment of Pap towards his son Huck who prefers to live in the woods instead of living with his abusive, drunken father for this reason he gives custody to Pap while the Widow and the Judge Thatcher try to win Huck‟s custody. In this part of the novel Twain tries to make a link between Huck‟s suffering from his abusive father and the slave Jim who suffers from slave hunters and his owner at the same time, therefore Twain attempts to show race relations not just through Jim but even Huck, because his father treats him as if he is his own property and he locks him in the cabin just like they do to slaves for the sake of taking his money “Every little while he locked me in and went down to the store, three miles, to the ferry, and traded fish and game for whisky”( Twain 26). Twain makes the issue of custody looks like an analogy to slaveholding because The Widow and Judge Thatcher try to take Huck away from his father just like Jim who is running away from his master looking for his freedom.
Pap prevents Huck from educating himself and he beats him all the time, he even mocks on his son because he learns how to write and speak “ou‟re educated, too, they say—can read and write. You think you‟re better‟n your father, now, don‟t you, because he can‟t? i’ll take it out of you” (Twain 21). Twain is giving hints of Huck‟s suffering due to his drunken father who is always beating him for the sake of taking his money from Judge Thatcher in this point Twain is focusing on the cruelty of white people and the way they treat their own sons because they did not beat only their Black slaves, and this can be seen through the character Pap who used to beat his son Huck and locks him inside the cabin in the woods.
By the end of the novel Twain does not make Jim run away from slavery and reach the North in defiance of the slave holding society but rather makes him free lawfully by his owner‟s will after her death here Twain is denouncing the fact that he is totally against slavery in the south and his aim is to free the slave Jim in the South as well all the other slaves and to give them their own freedom just like Blacks who lives in the North freely, Twain focuses on the fact that slavery should be outlawed in the South.
Twain attacks the hypocrisy of slavery. For example, the Widow Douglass and Miss Watson try to civilize Huck by teaching him Christian values but he knows that these values take more stock in the dead rather than in the living and they make Huck feel lonely, bored and uncomfortable (LitChart, Hypocrisy and Society). The contradiction between religion and slavery is hinted at right in the first pages of the novel when “they fetched the niggers in and had prayers” (Twain 3). Their Christianity does not make them treat slaves as human beings.
Indeed, Twain‟s attitude toward slavery is that he is against it. This is can be seen throughout the novel and especially characters‟ reaction towards others who support slavery. For example, the hypocrisy of Miss Watson because she preaches to Huck how she is going to live so as to go to the good place yet she owns slaves.
Twain also shows his distaste for slavery by portraying Pap‟s ignorance. Pap, boasting his belief that he is superior to blacks, for example he did not want to vote when he hears about the free “nigger” (mulatto) who has the right to vote, as if he is trying to show his superiority towards blacks.

2.9. Conclusion

In his novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Mark Twain tries to ridicule southern society over important issues characterizing that period such as slavery and racism that black people suffered from and were considered to be inferior to whites.
For this reason, he uses real events and real characteristics inspired by living persons. The novel does not support slavery but it denounces it through the society that Huck and Jim belong to and suffer from this society and the way its people behave.