The Adventures Of Huckleberry Finn Satire Analysis

Mark Twain, an American author of the 1800s, narrates the adventures of Huckleberry Finn in his novel The Adventure of Huckleberry Finn. Twain’s purpose is to expose the greedy nature of humanity and what effect it has to the society and the people. Twain highlights the lengths that people are willing to go through to benefit or gain for themselves through the satirical strategies of humour, irony, and derision. The author has adopted a humorous yet serious tone in order to compel the yearning for the refuge from the constraint environment of greed of the post-Civil War American easterners.

Twain largely uses humor whenever the Duke and the King are used to satirize greed. It is quite obvious that the author had used comical approach through many of the nonsensical antics of the two con men. The Royal Nonesuch being one of the many ideas that the king and the duke came up with to trick the townsmen. The Royal Nonesuch was an insubstantial and brief show directed by the duke and performed by the king. The audience,

comprehending that they were scammed, was enraged, but instead of warning the other townspeople of the farce play, they told the other people how great the show was, attracting as much audience for the next performance. As much as The Royal Nonesuch had demonstrated the selfishness of the duke and the king, conning innocent people with a horrible show, the audience’s action after the performance also revealed their nature of greed. Their preference to rather see the other townsfolk being ripped was their display of vindictiveness and selfishness as well as the opportunity for the duke and the king to be successful. In the end, most townspeople was tricked because of the audiences’ greedy desire to protect their pride. The immoral actions of these characters served as the catalyst for the questioning of morality in civilization.
Second, Twain utilizes irony to satirize greed. The duke and the king continue to be comical characters as their journey goes to another town where a wealthy family of Wilks lived, their main objective is to steal the inheritance of the said family. Although the king and the duke were able to gather sufficient amount of money from their previous scam, the king and the duke, is now playing the role of the two siblings of the dead brother, ironically manipulates the relatives of the Wilks family, exception to a few sharp characters, with their hilariously inept role-playing and fake accents. By doing so, Twain wished to emphasize the insatiable human desire to have more than what they need. In one of his essays, The Lowest Animal, Twain made a comparison between an earl and an anaconda. He explained his experiment of putting calves in the same room with the anaconda and the other with the earl. As his result, the snake only ate what they needed but the human on the other hand, slaughtered everything that was presented to them. This experiment concluded with the idea that humankind act on what they want instead of what they need. In another way to put it, the duke and the king’s action in conning the innocent family was an action of gluttony.
Twain uses a number incongruity to criticise the society that seems to be overflowing with the sin of greed through Huckleberry Finn.

The Adventure of Huckleberry Finn is a satirical historical fiction that ridicules the society for its greedy nature, and Twain’s decision to use a child as the main character to educate adult readers of the corruption of human society serves to be comical as well as absurd on its own. Huckleberry Finn is a model of the change that Twain wants to see in the civilization and one of the aspect of society the author wish to change is the greedy nature. In many instances, Huckleberry demonstrates compassion and selflessness. He, instead of attaching himself to the wealth he had earned in his previous adventure with Tom Sawyer, yearns for the nature that offers freedom. By depicting Huckleberry as wild and an outcast of society, Twain criticizes civilization for being the breeding ground for the corrupting sin of

greed.
It is through the author’s usage of humor, irony, and absurdity that Twain was successful in achieving his purpose. Twain exposed a part of society were greed was the primary value. He was able to reveal the greediness of civilization and raise awareness of the corruption taking place in society.