Cub Pilot On The Mississippi Racism

Reality and Human Struggle Tyranny violates the most basic of human principles and in addition possesses logical flaws. The nineteenth century steamboat industry illustrates a particularly clear variant of such tyranny, as well as showing the folly of those who wish to abide by it. Mark Twain’s “Cub Pilot on the Mississippi” is one of the clearest literary examples of it with examples of human struggle building up to combat, the conflict during combat, and then the absolute terror and miraculous ending which follows the combat. The cub’s mental battles before he fights with his commander sheds valuable insight into the failure of tyranny to promote progress. In particular, the cub’s daily verbal abuse at the hands of his commander,

The fight in “Cub Pilot on the Mississippi” shows human conflict in one of its most primal forms. The ensuing aftermath between the cub’s brawl with Brown contains further mental and literal clashes. The captain’s reaction is equal parts baffling and, for the cub, miraculous. The captain is completely in support of the cub as it is revealed that he hates Brown and as such his only issue is how to promote the cub’s actions whilst repramanding him. He chooses to do this by informing the cub that he supports his actions and will even pay for the cub attacking Brown, so long as the fighting is ashore and not on the steamboat. The remaining conflict is the issue of tradition relating to whether the cub should be sent away from the ship or not. The captain is put in a quandary over this as Brown informs the captain that he will not work on the same vessel as the cub. This struggle between the two is resolved, as the captain informs Brown to leave the vessel. The conclusion of the story yields more conflict and ties the tale together whilst simaltaneously illustrating human discord. “Cub Pilot on the Mississippi” brilliantly unveils the mental and physical struggles between authority and freedom, from both a