5-31-85 . . . Well, I finally finished reading Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn this afternoon, and now I know why it is considered to be a classic of American literature. Consider this passage, for example, in which Huck Finn analyzes the rightness, wrongness, and/or efficacy of lying:
I see I had spoke too sudden and said too much, and was in a close place. I asked her to let me think a minute; and she set there, very impatient and excited and handsome, but looking kind of happy and eased-up, like a person that’s had a tooth pulled out. So I went to studying it out. I says to myself, I reckon a body that ups and tells the truth when he is in a tight place is taking considerable many resks, though I ain’t had no experience, and can’t say for certain; but it looks so to me, anyway; and yet here’s a case where I’m blest if it don’t look to me like the truth is better and actuly safer than a lie. I must lay it by in my mind, and think it over some time or other, it’s so kind of strange and unregular. I never see nothing like it. (Chap. 28, p. 180; emphasis in original)
Isn’t this hilarious? I laughed countless times while reading the book, and am now anxious to read other works by Twain. Not only is he a master at capturing various dialects, but he paints vivid pictures with words. I felt like I was actually on the raft with Huck and Jim, so descriptive was the narrative and so well were the personalities developed. I especially like the way Twain gives moral consciences to (some of) his characters, and the way he satirizes people and institutions. If I read nothing else this summer, I’ll have read at least one classic. [I’ve never read anything else by Twain.]
Note from AnalPhilosopher: I probably wasn’t aware of it at the time, but I read the book during the 100th anniversary of its publication in the United States: 1885. It was first published in England in 1884.