How Did The River Affect Huck's Life

Finally, about halfway through the book, Huck meets a boy about his age named Buck Grangerford. The Grangerfords are involved in a hefty feud with a neighboring clan, the Shepherdsons. By choosing to illustrate such a petty scenario, Twain is criticizing southern society.

     Life on the river was also good at first, but it also became tiresome for Huck. He liked the sense of freedom that he had while he was on the river with Jim, he didn't have to go to school nor did he have any rules that he had to live by. He didn't have to worry about what his father was going to do to him. However the river still set limits on their freedom, Jim and Huck were only able to travel at night because they were afraid of Jim being found and whenever they would stop for the day, they would have to cover up the raft with leaves and foliage. Huck did not like having to be the one that would have to go look for food and water for them, he never had to be responsible until this time and, he didn't like having to use such precautions so that Jim would not be found. Huck could have made life easier for himself and turned Jim in, but he looked at him as a friend not as a fugitive slave.

Twain uses the river to illustrate feelings of security and freedom for both Huck and Jim alike, while providing in depth imagery that parallels it to a safe haven that is mainly unimpeded by the social ills of society. While living on the raft the two are isolated from the stagnant nature that the land possesses. On the river, Huck learns to finally think clearly and ponder about life for the non-oppressive environment allows him to develop. He considers it “lovely to live on a raft” for every night when he and Jim were laying down looking above at the sky, it was “all speckled with stars”(PAGE), unlike the “cramped and smothery”(96) nature of a house on land.

Buck, a boy who is the same age as Huck and is quite similar to Huck, teaches Huck both what a feud is and how destructive it can be. Both Huck and Buck seek action and adventure. Buck displays this clearly when Huck comes to the Grangerfords house and the men of the house search Huck to make sure he is not part of the enemy family, but Buck is only woken up when the interrogation of Huck was complete, and he complains “Well, nobody come after me, and it ain’t right. I’m always kept down; I don’t get no show” (97). Both Huck and Buck are looking to get in on the excitement. Because they are so similar, Huck and Buck quickly become good friends. The lesson that Huck learns from the Grangerfords is particularly forceful for Huck because the fight between the Grangerfords and the Shepherdsons results in Buck’s death. Huck sees first hand the death of Buck along with many other members of both families. This emotionally impacts Huck, and he explains that when he saw Buck die, “it made me so sick I most fell out of the tree” (114). Sophia Grangerford, who falls in love with Henry Sheperdson, teaches Huck another way of dealing with feuds. She shows him that an individual can overcome feuds and bridge gaps between families. This new subtle lesson comes up when Huck questions if he should go to hell near the end of the

The raft also played an important role in this journey, it is just as important as the river is. The river symbolizing Huck and Jim's life always in motion with transitional harmony, and the raft symbolizing their home in motion on the river. The raft made both Huck and Jim feel free from captivity and safe from the chaotic world around them. As the river controlled their journey the raft is what transported Huck and Jim on this journey, without the raft Huck and Jim would not have gotten as far as they did. The raft not only transported Huck and Jim but also helped to carry all of the supplies accumulated on this journey.

Flowing and penetrating through the deep seeded racism and violence of the deep South, the Mississippi river serves as a route of escape and a pathway of adventure for both Jim and Huck in Twain’s novel, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Jim utilizes the river as a passage to the North where he can achieve his freedom by breaking the chains of slavery of the South and furthermore, the river serves as an apparent heaven for Huck, who uses it to escape from the evils of society. In his novel, Twain describes the river as a place of freedom and as an escape from the violence on shore through his description of the river as a safe haven and heaven in order to convey his message that only when one isolates himself from society, can he discover

After staging his own death, Huck Finn flees the boundaries of his Pap and the society around him. But where is he off to? Well, the river of course. Throughout the novel Huckleberry Finn, the river that transports both Huck and Jim is a symbol of freedom. As Jim and Huck drift along the Muddy Mississippi, Huck is drifting away from the confinement of society at home and the abuse of Huck's father. Jim, on the other hand, is leaving the possibility of being sold to a slave trader in New Orleans. The river is the route they take to become free in all respects in the near future. This freedom allows them to travel in solace for awhile. Huck eventually learns that this freedom the river has given him comes with the responsibility to choose his

Huck escapes to Jackson Island, there he watches the rest of the town trying to find his body upond the rivah. He meets a runaway slave who went by the name of Jim. The two paired up together, and decided theyd make a nice life together travelling down the

So the family feud goes into the next level. When Huck goes to the woods he finds Buck and a nineteen-year-old “Grangerford” in a gunfight with the Shepherdsons. Both of “Grangerfords” are killed. This is an example of feud in the book. Feud happens everywhere, but people should try to stop them.

One day, he kidnaps Huck, takes him deep into the woods to a secluded cabin on the Illinois shore, and locks Huck inside all day while he rambles outside.

The two characters both see the river as meaning different things to them. To Huck, the river represents, no civilization which means no rules and that there is nobody there to tell him what to and what not to do. To Jim, the river symbolizes the freedom he hopes to soon have, and the freedom that the river will lead him to. As Huck and Jim are adventuring down the river, they come to the realization that they need each other to survive. Jim needs Huck to survive the trip down the river, and Huck needs Jim as a parental figure in his life. The river is the pathway Huck must take to mature in his life. The farther down the river the two go the more Huck’s maturity is strengthened. When Huck encounters the two men passing by on their canoe in the river, they ask him who is on the raft with him. Huck goes against what he knows to be right and replies, “He 's white”; this shows a sliver of the inner thoughts one has in the racist world back in this time (Twain 68).

When he goes to live with his father, he likes that a bit better because he lazes around all day and once again is allowed to swear. However, when Huck’s father becomes very abusive, Huck decides to leave and live by himself. The Mississippi symbolizes Huck’s freedom from society, as well as from his alcoholic father. The raft also symbolizes peace. When Huck and Jim were floating down the river on the raft Huck explains how it feels through this quote, “We said there warn't no home like a raft, after all. Other places do seem so cramped up and smothery, but a raft don't. You feel mighty free and easy and comfortable on a raft” (128). Being on the river definitely gave Huck and Jim a sense of freedom that neither one had before. This quote is in response to how much Huck is disturbed by the childish Grangerford/Shepherdson feud, and really exemplifies the peacefulness and comfort the river provides Jim and Huck compared to the irrationalness of society. The feud can represent an extreme example of social conflicts and the relationship between black and whites. The river is the only constant of Huck and Jim’s life, and is basically their home; it is their place of comfort.

Huck’s adventure down the river is very similar to one of Tom’s adventures in that it offers a false sense of freedom from society. Tom, a seemingly rebel character, pretends to fight society at all cost. His adventures, however, are all imaginary and ironically in reality he is quite happy with the society in which he lives. To Huck, Tom represents an adventurous spirit, which similarly the river offers. The idea of isolation from society and freedom from reality offers another parallel between Tom and the river. Both Tom and the river bring Huck into a world of his own. This allows them to challenge society on the outside, but also makes them lose sight of what their goal is. As we see near the end of the novel, Huck turns to Tom for a path to freedom for Jim. Tom’s failure to bring Jim to safety shows how losing sight of reality causes Jim to be captured. Knowing that Jim is free, Tom decides not to tell Huck and create an adventure to save Jim. This refusal in some ways parallels the needlessness of Huck and Jim’s adventure down the river. Heading down the river, Jim knows all along that Huck’s father is dead. However, he still refuses to tell Huck that he is free from the abuse and oppression of his father, just like how Tom refuses to tell Jim that he is free from the abuse and oppression of slavery.

To some a raft on a river may just be a little more than few pieces of wood strung together to form a crude platform that can travel slowly. But to some it means adventure and endless possibilities. As Huckleberry Finn and Jim can attest to a raft on a river is more than just a place to have fun; it is a place that can offer shelter and protection from societies toughest people and civilizations worst. As Huck Finn and Jim slowly float down the Mississippi, they encounter just about everything that a person would not want to encounter alone on a river. But through thick and thin Jim and Huck are always protected by the raft and the river. For example when Huck and Jim narrowly escape

Supposedly, concerned parents did not want their kids around Huck because he is a bad influence. That did not stop Tom though. Quickly, Tom and Huck become best friends. Huck is an orphan who does not stay in one place for very long. One night, Huck decides to take Tom to the graveyard. They were looking around for a little bit until they saw a group of guys. They sneak up just in time to see Doc Robertson holding what looked like a treasure map. Curiously, the boys cautiously inch closer and see Ingine Joe stab Doc numerous times and kill him. Shocked, the boys quickly run to Huck’s hideout. Huck makes Tom swear an oath not to report what they have just witnessed. The boys