Huck Finn Essay Mark Twain example essay topic

The topic: Discuss Twain's use of contrasting ideas or character foils. Huck Finn Essay Mark Twain was, without question, the finest satirist of his time. Through his writing, one can see a deeper morality than most of his time held. His novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was no exception; he used his gift of satire to show the flaws of the people around him. He contrasted the illusion of freedom to reality, ignorance with enlightenment, and what is perceived as good to what is truly good. The illusion of freedom is a powerful one; it allows people -- in this case, Huck -- to rest in a false sense of control over one's own life.

When Huck is with Widow Douglas, he feels that he can sneak out at night and be himself, but she is constantly trying to control his every move. After he and Pap leave society, he feels free from its constrictions, but he was kept under a rule that was stricter than before. After he ran away, he felt he was finally free, but he had to constantly hide and stay in certain places to avoid being caught. In anote of irony, the only place he is truly free is on the raft, the most physically confining place he can possibly be.

Another powerful illusion of mankind is that people typically believe they are more intelligent than they truly are. Many falsely believe themselves to always be correct, and are unable to see their mistakes, even when they are in plain view in front of them. When Tom Sawyer, and the other children form a band of robbers near the beginning of the novel, they aren't dismayed by the fact that they don't know what ransom is, and they have full confidence in their amazing abilities to misunderstand and incorrectly apply the stories they " ve read. The king and duke use this illusion against the people by profiting off their ignorance by putting on shows that appeal to the public's attraction to crass humor. Another piece of irony is that the two most intelligent people in the novel are the two that, under the time's stereotypes, were supposed to have been the most ignorant -- Huck Finn, a runaway, and Jim, a slave. A third delusion that is shown in the novel is the difference between what is perceived to be good and what truly is good.

Widow Douglas believed she was doing good by trying to turn Huck into a'civilized' child, but she was actually stifling him, and rather than bringing him into her world, she was actually pushing him away. Jim tried to help Tom after he was shot, but it was this act of good that allowed him to be recaptured. The king and the duke provide excellent examples of this, as well -- for example, giving a lecture on temperance in the hopes of making enough money to get drunk. Their original action can be perceived as good, but no true good comes from it. In The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain did an excellent job at showing humanity's delusions through eyes that, quite often, did not see them. Illusions of freedom, intelligence, and goodness continue through today.

Much like the people in Mark Twain " say, the present-day public is still unaware that they are duped by these every day of their lives.