“Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot.” (Twain 0) This is a notice found at the beginning of the novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn written by Mark Twain. It sounds as though the author wanted to be free to write as he pleased without being judged. His need for freedom is characterized through the two main characters of this novel. The reader learns about escaping from education and religion, slavery, moral struggles and childhood. Attaining freedom from the standards of southern society of the 1880 's drives the whole novel.
The pattern of conflict in this novel is escape. Huck escapes from the Widow Douglas because he did not like to be “sivilized”. Jim escapes because he does not want to be sold, he wants to be a free man. Huck then escapes from the abusive ways of his father. After staging his death and running away, Huck meets up with Jim. They decide to travel down the river together. Both of them are running away to gain their freedom: Jim from slavery, Huck from his father 's abuse and the Widow Douglas 's restrictive lifestyle. Jim becomes a father figure--the first Huck ever had in his life. Jim teaches Huck right and wrong, and an emotional bond develops through the course of their journey down the river. But then Twain introduces the struggle of morality through Hucks indecision if he should give Jim up or help him attain his dream of becoming a free man. Also, the struggle between right and wrong is again tested when Huck encounter scams, thievery and deceit during their travels down the river.During the last segment of the novel, Huck has learned to think like a man instead of a boy. He escapes his struggles of childhood when he learns to think like a man. This change is demonstrated when we see the prank that Tom Sawyer would have played
Cited: Twain, Mark. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. USA: The McGraw-Hill Companies Inc, 2000. Print.