Preview

Theme Of Satire In Huckleberry Finn

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
641 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Theme Of Satire In Huckleberry Finn
Throughout the world-renowned novel of Huckleberry Finn, one can argue that religious satire plays an instrumental role for the overall plot. This satire does not only make the book more humorous but is the main way Twain can convey his message about conventional religion. Through out the first chapters, one can conclude that Twain disagrees with traditional religious views. This becomes critically clear to the reader through Twain’s comical inferences of satire in the first chapter that run the gamut from disregarding the authenticity of the Bible to plainly mocking the common core beliefs of Catholicism. After reading the novel, one can agree that Twain completely communicates his message through humorous satire.
One example where Twain’s satire concurs with his religious morality is when he writes about the Shepardson family. This predominately Catholic family has a long history of a blood feud with the Grangerford family. These families have a lethal relationship together that each family brings guns to every outing. The pivotal where Twain satirizes these family’s beliefs is when he brings up the church scene. In this scene, the Shepardsons and Grangerfords families calmly sit through the sermon with their guns in hand. The ironic part of all this is that this sermon is talking
…show more content…
From his satire of religion on the concept of religion, one can see that he was not a follower of religion, which was very rare during his day. Twain’s abolitionist views involving slavery put him way ahead of his time. Through Twain’s amazing satire which consisted of his own morality and views on religion one can argue that Twain fully got his message to the reader. Twain’s message of religion was easily understood by the way in which he told it through a child’s viewpoint. Twain’s simplistic terms provided the reader with an elementary understanding of racism in the

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    In his novel Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain uses satire to criticize different aspects of society. The book follows an unruly boy named Huck and a slave named Jim throughout their adventures. During one episode, Huck lives with a wealthy family called the Grangerfords. While living with them, Huck is informed of a feud between the Grangerford family and the Shepardson family that had been going on for some 30 years. Over that time, many people from each family had been killed in the name of the feud. Shortly after Huck learns of this feud, Sophia Grangerford runs off to elope with Harney Shepherdson. After both families heard about this, they engage in a gunfight in which Huck escapes back to the raft with Jim. In this episode, Twain uses multiple satirical devices to criticize “civilized” society.…

    • 714 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In Mark Twain’s “The Adventure of Huckleberry Finn” there are many examples of greed satire throughout the book. One major example of greed is when Huck’s pap comes back to see Huck after he learns that Huck has made some money and become decently wealthy. He was given the money from his mother for when she died. Pap came back and demanded that he get the money right then. They wouldn’t let him cash the money in because it was for Huck. His Pap needed the money really bad and he tried to steal his son’s own money. So when he left to go to the store Huck faked his death while his Pap was gone. After Huck left pap went running around looking for his son. He wanted the money that Huck had run off with. “I’ve been in town for two days, and I hain’t…

    • 776 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In “The £1,000,000 Bank-Note,” Twain uses satire to highlight the power of money and its influence on the behavior of people from all classes of nineteenth-century English society. The earliest examples of satire in the text are when Henry meets the owners of the eating house and the tailor shop. Both owners regard Henry as an upper-class gentleman and allow him to make purchases on credit based on his perceived status. In fact, when Henry warns the proprietor of the tailor shop that he may have to wait an indefinite amount of time for his dues to be paid, the proprietor doesn’t seem concerned at all. He says, “Indefinitely! It’s a weak word, sir, a weak word. Eternally—that’s the word, sir.” The proprietor’s use of the word eternally stresses…

    • 473 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Example 1: The first example of satire is from chapter 16 when a homeowner sees Jim and thinks that he is an intruder and sends his dogs on to him, then as soon as he realizes that Huck is with him he calls them off, this is a form of satire because it is funny because people often do that to people depending on their race, as in racial profiling. For example if he had seen Huck first he may not have sent his dogs onto them.…

    • 483 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    There isn’t any book out there in the world that is known that Mark Twain doesn’t use satire. In Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Huck tries to decide whether he should “commit a sin” to steal back a captured slave, and when he sees that he wants to steal Jim back, he tears up the note and says, “All right, then, I’ll go to h___”. (208). This is satirical because Twain is using irony to show that Huck thinks he is doing something horrible when he is actually doing a good deed. This is an example of a “good” satirical technique used in the book. However, there are plenty reasons why many schools have banned the book. For example, Twain uses broadside a lot causing libraries and schools to think of it as being racist making them banning the…

    • 367 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    In The Adventures of Huck Finn Mark Twain uses satire and irony to teach an overall theme. An example of irony and satire being used in the story is when Jim and Huck are floating in the raft and Jim is anxious to find Cairo. this is because, as Huck mentions, “he'd be a free man the minute he seen it, but if he missed it he would be in slave country again and no more show for freedom” (88). This is an example of satire because it exposes society's long-held belief that once in a state without slavery Jim will be free. Though he may be free from slavery, he is not free from society's perceptions of him. He is still subject injustice because he is an African American man. It is also ironic because it brings people to their senses that Jim will…

    • 236 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Mark Twain wrote the renowned nineteenth century novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn as a humorist, with intentions solely entertain the reader. Although the author warns at the start of the book, “persons attempting to find a moral in this narrative will be banished”, he submerses the reader into Southern society to evaluate their values (Notice). Satirists seek to find motives behind people’s actions and by dramatizing the contrast between appearance and reality; they strive to aware readers of the unpleasant truths within society. With both satire and irony, Twain exposes the selfish qualities of Southern society and their unreligious morals through his realist perspective.…

    • 920 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    And as to the question about Twain’s use of humor, I do not think that it reflects skepticism and distrust towards the society portrayed in the story, because so far the bulk of the humor seems to be in good nature and not pointing fatal flaws in the way the society…

    • 687 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Satire in Huckleberry Finn

    • 1809 Words
    • 8 Pages

    In chapters 1-4 of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain, Twain's characters tend to get worked up over the silliest of superstitions. In the second chapter, when Huck accidentally flicks a spider into a flame, he, “Was so scared and most shook the clothes off [him]” (Twain 3). He counters the burden that the dead spider will bring by performing plenty of even more odd acts like turning around while crossing his breast and tying up a lock of his hair to ward off the witches. Huck is still anxious because he hadn't been told that any of those counter charms were good for removing the penance of killing a spider. Most superstitions throughout these chapters stem from one person telling another of an irrational belief they hold as the truth like Jim's “magical” hair-ball that he profits off of by telling people very vague fortunes (Twain 17-18). Some of these fortunes come true, so people tell others about the miraculous magic hair-ball.…

    • 1809 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Navonne Johns once expressed, “A person’s character is shown through their actions in life not where they sit on Sunday” (Quoted in “Quotes About Misleading” 1). Mark Twain shows this religious bigotry through his depiction of the Grangerford and Shepardson family. The two families come to church, and listen to a sermon on brotherly love, while in the next day, kill one another. Contributing to this example, Twain mocks religion through The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn with his satirical attacks on organized religion versus religious beliefs, which contributes to the theme of spiritual hypocrisy.…

    • 929 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    However, the novel was not a merely a basic story, it was a powerful mean of political propaganda, and had Twain left out what makes the book so controversial, the significance of said propaganda would have completely fallen flat, as there would have been no controversy to carry it. An example of anti- religious propaganda from the book would be: “When we got back to the raft and he come to count up he found he had collected eighty-seven dollars and seventy-five cents. And then he had fetched away a three-gallon jug of whisky, too, that he found under a wagon when he was starting home through the woods. The king said, take it all around, it laid over any day he’d ever put in in the missionarying line. He said it warn’t no use talking, heathens don’t amount to shucks alongside of pirates to work a camp-meeting with” (Twain 129). This shows Twain’s mockery of the religious, and how they are fooled into giving an obvious con-man (at least from Huck’s perspective) money. This is also satirical because it the King is an apparent con artist to the reader, but the devout Christians can barely look beyond the religious veil that covers their eyes. During the 1840s, religion was thought to make one see the world clearer, so satire is played out by this. His abolition propaganda is demonstrated when Aunt Sally asked Huck if he was late because his boat had grounded. He responded with, “It warn’t the grounding—that didn’t keep us back but a little. We blowed out a cylinder-head.” Aunt Sally said, “Good gracious! anybody hurt?” Huck replied, “No’m. Killed a nigger.” Aunt Sally’s response was a prime example of satire and propaganda: “Well, it’s lucky; because…

    • 1757 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Mark Twain’s satire was so severe toward society that the latter considered it outrageous, rough, coarse, immoral and inelegant. It was banned from libraries for years. This proves how deeply Huck Finn had reached its targets, namely corrupt society and institutions.…

    • 4981 Words
    • 20 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    irony in Huckle Finn

    • 779 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Throughout the entire book, The Adventure of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain used irony to expose the dark and absurd society during that time. The contrasts between the gorgeous appearances and decayed nature present readers the benighted and selfish qualities of human. Also, the ironical descriptions about Romanticism show readers the unrealistic and impractical society. Lastly, people’s daily dialogue reflects black people’s menial positions. Mark Twain tried to unveil the greedy, foolish and racist human nature with the use of irony and satire.…

    • 779 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    It is obvious that Mark Twain intended for readers of Huckleberry Finn to discover the hidden messages, meanings, and lessons within the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. At the beginning of the novel, Twain states that “Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot” to cause the curious reader to search for such things. Most of these secret messages are written through satire, allowing Twain to point out and ridicule societal ills at the time. Racist, ignorant, and cruel thoughts or individuals are…

    • 695 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Laughter is the first thing that a newborn child does when they are born into the world. From the beginning, they know how to laugh from ear to ear. The expression of joy through laughter is a force to be reckoned with. The natural response to humor is to come close to it and the opposite can be said for pain. It is one of the best remedies for things such as physical and emotional pain as well as help maintain a healthy relationship with friends and family.…

    • 483 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays