Huck Finn first blogpost

            Based on the 1st 10 chapters, what are your impressions of Huck? Use direct evidence to support your thoughts.

Through the first ten chapters of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, written by Mark Twain, Huck has gained a definite personality. Huck immediately expresses his dislike in the widow’s effort to try to civilize him. He tells the reader that he hates wearing the clothes that she puts him in, and finds the daily routine in the widow’s household quite tiresome. Huck would much rather be outside of the house in rags and dirt than inside trying to be civilized. The only thing stopping him from doing so was the closest person in his life to family. Huck does not count the widow as his family, and besides his actual father, Huck has none. But Huck finds comfort in listening to Tom Sawyer. “… I lit out. I got into my old rags and my sugar hogshead again, and was free and satisfied. 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” (Twain 11). Although he disliked his civilized life, he much less prefers living with his father, who takes him to a cabin in the woods and keeps Huck captive from the widow as his legal guardian. He likes living in the woods, besides his father, and expressed his enjoyment of having no responsibilities. “It was kind of lazy and jolly, lying off comfortable all day, smoking and fishing, and no books nor study” (Twain 32). I believe that Huck wants nothing more than to be independent. He is confident in himself enough that he believes that he can live on his own in the wild and in the dirt. Huck creates a personality that reflects the naivety of a child but the strength to be on his own like a grown man.

Although Huck believes that he is strong and hard-willed, he is afraid of some things. Although he reflects on the fear of his father and his beatings, his is more afraid of superstitions, and deep down, being alone. While still living with the widow, Huck shows the reader how terrified he is of superstitions. “I didn’t need anybody to tell me that that was an awful bad sign and would fetch me some bad luck, so I was scared and most shook the clothes off me”(Twain 13). Although Huck often shows strength in times where a modern day child of his age would be scared, his fear of bad luck and superstition shows that he has flaws in his courage. In his time of fear he also expresses his loneliness and his wish for company. “I felt so lonesome I wished I was dead…I got so downhearted and scared I did wish I had some company” (Twain13). Although Huck wants to be independent, and living a life of adventure, deep down he must also wish for camaraderie. He finds this in Tom, and also Jim, when they are living on the island together. The personality gained by Huck in the first ten chapter of Huckleberry Finn is one of an independent but lonely child who craves adventure but also friendship.