Huck Finn
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Huck Finn is very different than the society that he was born into. Huck always takes things very to the point. This not only adds to the humor of the book, but it also lets some of the books deeper messages come through. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, traces the story of a boy, Huck Finn, from conformity to the Southern way of thinking, to his own ideas about religion, wealth and slavery.
In the beginning of the book Huck is cannot understand the ideas of Miss Watsons heaven and hell. When Miss Watson tells Huck that he will get anything he prays for, he takes it very literally and decides to pray for fishing line, which he gets. But praying for fishing hooks didnt seem to work, when he asks her to pray for him to get some fishing hooks she calls him an idiot.
Huck doesnt understand how much money he has in the bank, while he finds smaller amounts more important. Six thousand dollars was a fortune in the time that the book was written, unlike the rest of his society he wasnt impressed by it. He could use ten cents to buy some food, or five cents to buy some fishing line, but he had no use for huge sums of money. Society put value on wealth and property and book learning. Huck placed his value on free living. He saw no reason for any of the things society valued when you could float down the grand Mississippi with a friend.
On the plantation Jim was just a slave, and even though Huck liked Jim back then they could never have been friends because Jim was a black slave and Huck was white. Jim always looked out for Huck and talked with him. He showed Huck that he loved his family just like a white man loved his family. Society had impressed upon Huck the concept that slavery was acceptable. However, as the story unfolds he comes to know Jim as a human and not a piece of property.
At the end of the book we find how right Huck is about Jim. We find that southern culture