In the beginning of Huckleberry Finn, Jim and Huck have a solid friendship, but as the novel goes on, their relationship strengthens and Jim starts to take on characteristics of a father towards Huck. Huck is a poor and uneducated white boy that comes into a corrupt society with a drunkard father, and Jim is a runaway slave that lost his family. Traveling up the Mississippi River, Huck learns that Jim is mature, loving, and passionate towards Huck. Their relationship grows which is seen during the journey of Jim’s escape from slavery. Although Huck has a father, he torments and teaches Huck the wrong way of living justly. Because of this, Huck does not see him as a father, but he does learn from him. He learns to do the opposite of what he does. "Yes, he's got a father, but you can't never find him these days. He used to lay drunk with the hogs in the tanyard, but he hain't been seen in these parts for a year or more" (Twain 17). Pap is a drunkard that is lazy and does not take care of his son, which causes Huck and Pap’s relationship to spread apart. Because …show more content…
An example of this is towards the end of “The River” scene. Huck is contemplating on whether to help Jim escape, or to turn him back in. Jim, knowing the state that he is in, says, “Jim won’t ever forgit you, Huck; you’s de bes’ fren’ Jim’s ever had; en you’s de only fren’ ole Jim’s got now” (120). Jim knows that Huck is a morally good person; therefore, this plea causes Huck to help Jim escape due to Huck’s emotions about slavery. Due to the fact that Jim knew he was in a tough situation, he finds an escape route by tricking Huck into helping him. At this time, slaves were seen as dumb and gullible, but by this trick, Jim is seen as mature and smarter than other slaves. Intelligence is key to being a father figure and this situation proves that Jim is mentally capable of filling in that
He risks his freedom to help the doctor save Tom’s life and help Huck successfully escape the Shepherdsons’. Jim shows his appreciation for Huck bringing him on this journey toward freedom by telling him he will never forget him for helping him and lying to protect his hope. On the other hand, Jim can be considered intelligent due to his belief in ghosts. But, he also posses great common sense in situations where he must protect others such as Huck. Just as Jesus Christ shed light on all things human, Jim put important aspects of his life on the line and when others so that for him, he shows how thankful he is through
In The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain paints the story of a developing friendship between two entirely different people which at the time society considered unacceptable and taboo. Huckleberry Finn is a white thirteen year old boy and Jim is a middle-aged black runaway slave. They meet by coincidence while they are both hiding out on Jackson’s Island located in the middle of the Mississippi River, Huck is hiding from the townspeople who think he is dead, and Jim has runaway and is hiding from his owner. Throughout their journey together, Huck and Jim’s relationship goes from them being mere acquaintances, then to friends, then to them having a father and son relationship.
	Huck with his anti-society attitude, you would presume that he would have no problem in helping Jim. Yet he fights within himself about turning over Jim to the authorities, by this action within Huck shows that he must have feelings that slavery is correct so that the racial bigotry of the time may be seen. This decision for Huck is monumental even though he makes it on the spot. He has in a way decided to turn his back on everything that "home" stands for, this allows us to leave our thought of bigotry behind and begin to see Jim for what he really is a man.
Jim's influence gave Huck something that he needed all of his life: a role model. Through this maternal role, he teaches Huck to value friendship, that society is not always right, the convenient way out may not always be right, and how to make moral decisions. These lessons are taught by example, not mere verbalization. Therefore, Jim was the best example of a parent Huck ever experienced. The exposure Huck received to Jim caused him to mature very quickly, especially for the small amount of time they were on the river. This growing maturity not only saved Huck's life during their adventures, but Jim's as well. This is the ultimate lesson Huck learned, that your actions effect others around you.
Huck's Pap thought that he was trying to out do him, because he went to school. You've put on considerable frills since I've been away. I'll take you down a peg before I get done with you. You think you're better than your father, now don't you, because he can't? I'll take it out of you.
As juxtaposition to the fantasy of Tom Sawyer's gang, Huck encounters real robbers and murderers on the wrecked Walter Scott steamboat. After hearing their plans, Huck tells Jim, “If we find their boat we can put all of 'em in a bad fix -- for the Sheriff ’ll get 'em” (262); despite his developing nihilism , Huck decides to trap the men by stealing their boat. Here Huck has drastically affected the fate of the men, whether it be dying or being arrested, and eventually he realizes his responsibility: “I begun to worry about the men...I begun to think how dreadful it was, even for murderers, to be in such a fix” (263). To remedy the situation in response to his sudden guilt, Huck employs (deceives) the captain of the ferryboat to rescue the men. Huck applauds his altruism, saying “I was feeling ruther comfortable on accounts of taking all this trouble for that gang, for not many would have done it” (265) but fails to realize his irony: “not many [people] would have” boarded the wreck in the first place, much less trapped the men. Regardless, Huck has shown he can act freely, but not free from his conscience, which will prove important later in the novel, specifically at the climax.
Huckleberry Finn, a young boy from St. Petersburg’, is able to disregard the typical views of African Americans and see them as the humans they are. When Huck and Jim begin to converse and learn more about each other Huck is constantly surprised by Jim’s knowledge; even
Huck got a glimmer of hope when the village thought they found Pap drowned in the river, but Huck reasoned that the body was not Pap, and Huck expresses his fear when he says, "So I was uncomfortable again. I judged the old man would turn up by and by, though I wished he wouldn't" (Twain, 11). Huck’s fear of Pap is so extreme that Pap’s survival comes as a disappointment. Huck wishes Pap would stay away and never come back, but he keeps coming back to get money for whiskey,which Huck gives to him because it will make him go away. The whole town knows that Pap is abusive and they are always trying their best to get him sober or legally take Huck away from him, but they never manage to succeed. Pap doesn't even want Huck to be educated, and orders him to stop going to school. Neither Pap nor Huck's mother learned to read, and Pap accuses Huck of feeling superior because he is getting an education. In contrast to Pap, Jim is always kind to Huck during their journey, and he drinks alcohol to relieve venom from a snake bite, not to get drunk like Pap. He is never abusive to Huck, and is a better father to Huck than Pap ever
In the beginning of the story, Huck seems to feel at ease to be with his father instead of being with the widow, "It was kind of lazy and jolly, lying off comfortable all day, smoking and fishing, and no book nor study." (Twain 24) Yet, Hucks' father is not exactly the father figure a child would want. He's an abusive, "But by and by Pap got to handy with his hick'ry and I couldn't stand it. I was all over welts." (Twain 24) and he's not thoughtful of Huck. Once Huck figures his father is crazed and is an alcoholic, Twain, through Huck's eyes, gives readers a feeling of fear towards Huck's father. "There was Pap looking wild, and skipping around every which way and yelling about snakes. He said they was crawling up his legs." (Twain 28) "Then he went down on all fours and crawled off, begging them to let him alone, and he rolled imself up in his blanket and wallowed in under the old pine table, still a-begging; and then he went to crying." (29)
...all along Jim was free but being the adventurous boy he is he wanted Jim to turn out and be a hero like the one’s he reads about. Tom knows Jim could have been freed multiple times if he didn’t put him up to all of the childish games. Jim had stayed by Tom’s when he almost died and would do anything for him but Tom couldn’t give Jim the same respect back. His foolishness behavior caused Jim more pain and almost didn’t get him freed. Jim was a father figure to both boys and he stood by Huck’s side since the beginning of the novel.
Huck Finn thinks about his father in an unusual way. Huck does not like his father, which makes sense because his father is a greedy drunk, however Huck still looks up to his father as a role model. Pap is not a good role model for Huck because of his history of abusing Huck and his random disappearances. When Pap tries to gain custody of his Huck, the judges side with him just because he is the father. This is shown when Huck says “The judge and the widow went to law to ge...
Pap is Huck’s father, but Huck does not like him because he is abusive, a drunk, and does not treat huck good at all. Still he taught Huck so much in his life. One of the things he teaches Huck is how to borrow, “it warn’t no harm to borrow things if you was meaning to pay them back some time”. But of course he would never pay them back. Pap also teaches Huck that you don’t need to go to school, but Pap is just afraid that Huck will become smarter than him.
Huck and Jim's friendship undergoes many twists and turns along with the trip the two take down the Mississippi River. With each adventure their friendship grew stronger and deeper from their encounter with the Duke and the King to the riverboat scene the friendship is built one building block at a time. Throughout the novel Jim makes references to the kindness that Huck shows him, but Huck seems oblivious to their new found friendship. "Dah you goes, de ole true Huck; de on'y white genlman"...(pg. 89) When Jim made this statement Huck realized just how much this friendship meant to Jim.
In the beginning, Huckleberry Finn hasn?t fully formed opinions on topics such as slavery. He is quite immature and content to just have ?adventures? with his friends. During his journey on the raft, he learns much more about himself through his dealings with others. He establishes his very own standards of right and wrong. Huck?s most important lessons are learned through Jim. He learns to see Jim as a person rather than as a slave: ?I knowed he was white inside? (263). More than any other character in the book, Jim is a catalyst for Huck?s maturity. Through Jim as well as other people he meets along the way, Huck becomes a more defined person who?s more fully himself. His development through the course of the novel proves The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn to be a gradual journey toward growth and maturity.
In the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Pap is a horrible parent to Huck, and constantly berates him. When he hears about Huck's new 6000 dollar fortune, he comes back to town to get back his son and the money. He is furious when he finds that he cannot get the money, and he becomes even more enraged when he finds out that Huck is going to school and living a civilized life. He says to Huck