Huck Finn Women's Role

In Mark Twain's novel Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the adults in Huck's life play an important role in the development of the plot. Pap, Huck's father, constantly abuses the boy, never allowing him to become an intelligent or decent human being. He beats and attacks Huck whenever they meet up, and tries to destroy Huck's chances of having a normal life. This situation is balanced by several good role models and parent figures for Huck. Jim, the runaway slave, embraces Huck like a son, and shares his wide ranging knowledge with him. He also protects Huck on the journey down the river. Widow Douglas is another good role model for Huck. She tries to civilize him and make him respectable to society,

Widow Douglas is a Christian woman who takes care of Huck while his father is absent. She is the main mother figure that Huck has; therefore, has an influential role in Huck’s moral development. The Widow is extremely willing to take Huck in. In the beginning of this novel, Huck explains that, “the Widow Douglas, she took me for her son, and allowed she would civilize me; but it was rough living in the house all the time…”(Chapter 1). Widow Douglas enjoyed the task of making Huck civilized. To Widow Douglas, being a civilized human means being proper, polite and acting in a respectful manner. In her house, there are strict rules, and no leniency for breaking them. She teaches Huck about the Bible, and makes him say grace before every meal. Her morality includes always acting in a traditional conforming way. When Huck and Tom are conversing about a hypothetical genie situation, Tom says; ”how you talk, Huck Finn. Why, you'd HAVE to come when he rubbed it, whether you wanted to or not" (Chapter 3). Tom knows that Huck is well mannered. He knows that even if Huck does not want to do something, he will if it is the right thing to do because of the values that the widow has instilled on him. Widow Douglas does not allow Huck to argue against her, for her word is always what goes. Widow Douglas has pure intentions for Huck in her efforts to make him into a civil man. She forces Huck to rid himself his bad

Huck is a free spirit who finds socially acceptable actions to be restrictive and unbearable. This is demonstrated after Huck and his best friend Tom Sawyer find a large amount of money. The Widow Douglas adopts Huck. With Widow Douglas, Huck feels as though society's values and norms

At the beginning of Huck’s narration, he immediately mentions his previous adventures with Tom Sawyer; by instinctively introducing himself in terms of Tom’s story, Huck demonstrates that he thinks of himself more as a supporting character to Tom’s life than the protagonist to his own. This belief also compels Huck to listen to Tom’s advice. When the Widow Douglas decides to civilize Huck, he initially runs away in disgust, but Tom ultimately convinces him to stay. Huck explains, “But Tom Sawyer he hunted me up and said he was going to start a band of robbers, and I might join if I would go back to the widow and be respectable. So I went back,” (1). Tom’s influence outweighs Huck’s instinct to escape civilization, and Huck instead chooses to try to become “respectable” like Tom. Despite Huck’s multiple sets of ideologies, the values he adopts from Tom Sawyer prevail as the most influential and serve as a guide for many of Huck’s

Huck’s feelings about living with the Widow Douglas and her sister, Miss Watson. Which of the ladies does he like more? Why? What does he feel about their attempts to “civilize” him?

When Huck was done telling her, she was surprised and astonished, but she wanted revenge. Huck talked her out of it. She realized that it would be better to do what Huck said, so she listened to his every word. Before Mary Jane leaves, Huck gives her a piece of paper that has the place of her inheritance money, written in it. She also told him that she would always remember him, and try to visit him one time or another. Huck adds, that he hasn’t seen her since.

The Widow Douglas and Miss Watson try to “sivilize” Huck by trying to have him conform from his outsider habits to that of a proper member of society (Twain, 11). Furthermore, they attempt to take him apart and reengineer him to not reflect his previous twelve years experiences and mold him into becoming their stereotypical good boy. However, from the very start of the novel, Huck clearly elaborates on the fact that he does not want to conform to society and states “The Widow Douglas she took me for her son, and allowed she would sivilize me... I got into my old rags and my sugar hogshead again, and was free and satisfied” (page 11). This statement is a testament to Huck own personal will because it is rough for him to be confined to a house and the strict rules of the Widow Douglas.

Huck took action against the frauds because he couldn't help the Duke and King rob the girls after seeing that Mary Jane and her sisters are kind people.

One of the interesting concepts included in the beginning of Huck Finn was that there were no supportive parent figures. You could make the argument that the widow was a supportive parent figure for Huck, however, I believe her character is more trying change Huck to fit her ideal son. In the book there are two main parent figures, the widow and Huck’s father. The widow is Huck’s mother figure in the first part of the book and as Huck says she is very constricting (19). The widow wanted Huck to be something that he was not.

Huck feels that Mary Jane is very nice and so he should not let the two frauds, the King and Duke, take all of their money. “I say to myself, this is a girl that i'm letting that old reptle rob her of her money”(132). Hucks believe it not right to let the two fraud take all the money from the girls and so he was deciding rather to go tell the truth to Mary and her sisters. Hucks feels bad for not saying anything and letting the King and the Duke take their money. “And when she got through, they all jest laid themselves out to make me feel at home and know I was amongst friends”(132). Huck made his mind up to get the money for the girls. Here, Twain thinks it is not right to not tell the truth and let someone go into trouble. Huck’s decision in telling Mary Jane the truth and to lie to the King and the Duke shows how Twain is saying it is not right to watch a person take advantage of someone. It showing that telling the truth is better than lying because not telling the truth can put a person in danger. Huck is thinking about whether he should tell Mary Jane because the truth because the truth is always better and safer than

What the Widow and Miss Watson do not do is explain to Huck why he is doing unnecessary chores and acting so properly. When Miss Watson would say things like "Don't put your feet up there, Huckleberry;" and “Why don't you behave", Huck’s young mind asks himself, ‘Why should I behave?’ All of the critiques of Huck’s behavior makes him think that if he stays with the Widow and Miss Watson he will always be failing. His attitude toward the goals that the two sisters have for Huck change with every order he receives and eventually the two “kept pecking at me, and it got tiresome and lonesome." At this point Huck’s sentiment towards living in their house moves to more of a prison like atmosphere and, “considering how dismal regular and decent the widow was in all her ways; and so when I couldn’t stand it no longer, I lit out”. He realizes that he is being held against his will, only after he realizes how “regular” and boring the two women are. This is very telling of his character and the same mentality of an ‘against the grain’ lifestyle pushes Huck to question the people and environments around him. The freedom Huck realizes from the sisters’ house of “sivlized” teachings is not the type Huck looks for and his oppressive time with pap

Being that this is his only real family, he does not have anyone to abandon if he were to one day leave. Due to the maliciousness of Pap and his poor life-choices, Huck is damaged almost beyond repair; leaving would simply be an improvement. Miss Watson is another character that sparks his need to escape from the society that he lives in. “Miss Watson she kept pecking at me, and it got tiresome and lonesome. By-and-by they fetched the n*ggers in and had prayers, and then everyone was off to bed” (Twain 7). The way that she raises Huck, in the large absences of Pap, is in a way that proves to be ineffective. She attempts to teach Huck religion and education, but because of his longing to free of the grips of civilization, she is unsuccessful. Due of the fact that his only major adult caretakers are his abusive father and strict Miss Watson, Huck has motivation that ultimately drives what will become his adventure. However, this is not an adventure; Twain reveals that it is instead an escape from society to break away from the civilization that Miss Watson is attempting to force him into and more importantly, to be free of his abusive upbringing.

In the book, the widow Douglas was in charge of Huck, and he lived by her rules and listened to her. However, when Huck’s father came back to get his son, Huck didn’t show much respect on the grounds that his father didn’t have as much power over Huck than widow Douglas. Mark Twain didn’t show much power from women in his book, and that is due to the reason that during the time he wrote the book, women indeed did not have as much power. Some women, nonetheless, did have the power, just like the widow, because of a husband being

The woman we will take a look at and thoroughly analyze through a feminist lense is Mrs. Loftus. At this point in the story, Huck and Jim are laid up on Jackson Island on the outskirts of his hometown St. Petersburg, Missouri. Huckleberry runs into Mrs. Loftus because he is curious to learn more about what the town knows concerning his “death”. Before Huck even enters

A maternal figure is never mentioned in the novel causing a reader to believe she either 1) died during childbirth, 2) died of disease, or 3) was killed. Children have a longing for their mother even when in the mother’s womb. Once born, a mother’s touch, voice, and even face plays an influential role on a child’s development. Having a lack of love, especially when an abusive parental figure is in the picture, a child does not develop a stable relationship with that parent, therefore resulting in a lack of trust. Huck dealt with an abusive, alcoholic father that beat him and did not show love towards him, “He chased me round and round the place with a clasp-knife, calling me the Angel of Death, and saying he would kill me, and then I couldn’t come for him no more,” (Twain 31). Pap beating him led to Huck being nervous because he did not know where Pap was or if he would ever return to town, “What I wanted to know was, what he was going to do, and was he going to stay?” (Twain 17). This often leads to one being unable to maintain stable relationships later on in life, but leads to the child being independent due to fending for themselves for so long. Huck shows this characteristic by not wanting to be around the widow and Miss Watson, “Then she told me all