Wicked White World :: essays research papers

â€Å"Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a moral will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot - By Order of the Author,† (Twain 1) reads the â€Å"Notice† before The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain. Twain claims that he wrote the entire novel purely as an adventure story, and had no intention of creating a deeper statement about the human condition. On the contrary, Twain creates an insight into humanity that the reader hardly expects from the author’s impractical notice. He does this by using the two main characters in the novel, Huck Finn, an uneducated boy running away from civilization and Jim, the runaway slave. As these two misfits float down the Mississippi River on a raft, Twain uses the character of Jim and his interactions with others to defy the white perception of the Negro and to ultimately demonstrate his place in American society. Twain does th is by showing how Jim does not form to the mold of the stereotypical slave, has real emotions just like anyone else and is an example of the Negro’s social standing at that time. In the beginning of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Twain introduces Jim by describing the stereotypical Negro. Jim represents the ignorance and superstitions that most white believed to be the slaves persona. As seen through the eyes of Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn, Jim personifies the stereotypical characteristics of the carefree and often ridiculous Negro. This is demonstrated when the reader first meets Jim, as Tom and Huck attempt to sneak out of the house. Jim, hears the boys moving and decides to wait until he hears it again but promptly falls asleep. Tom moves Jim’s hat by hanging it on a tree limb. â€Å"Afterward Jim said the witches bewitched him and put him in a trance, and rode him all over the state, and then set him under the trees again, and hung his hat on a limb to show who done it,† (Twain 6). This ignorant and illogical explanation illustrates the stereotypical white opinion of Negroes in America. Later in the novel, Huck goes to Jim for help in conj uring the future. The reader sees the ridiculous side of the typical Slave classification. Jim’s prized possession is a hairball that was taken from the stomach of an ox. â€Å"He said there was a spirit inside of it, and it knowed