Huck Finn 1-4

“All modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain called

Huckleberry Finn…All American writing comes from that.” E.H.

Twain’s “firsts”

• First American writer to write successfully in the vernacular. (What’s that?) - Huck, Jim, and others – crude and undignified

• First to successfully infuse comedy – Dinner at the Widow’s; Later, lecture on temperance but the lecturers “don’t make enough money to get drunk.”

Realism and the death of Romanticism

• Romanticism – Washington Irving, Poe, Hawthorne – nostalgia, idealism, beauty in nature, individualism

• Civil War• Realism – adherence to truth; “slice of life,”

accuracy and honesty, 1st lines of Huck Finn (you’ll be trying to write like this)

• Some are offended – Louisa May Alcott demands that it be banned (1st of many attempts) – No problem for Twain; he advertised its banning and sales went up 3000%

Chapters 1-4Tell some stories!

• What do you think? (always my first question!)

• Suppertime• Out at night and the cave• Ambuscade and the A-rabs• Judge Thatcher and the money • The hairball• Pap

Emerging themesHow are these introduced?

• Sivilization

• Religion

• Race/ class