Risks And Rewards In Mark Twain's The Adventures Of Tom Sawyer

Becky Thatcher’s Risks & Rewards
In 1623, Shakespeare wrote his first Folio. Almost 300 years later, in 1876, Mark Twain wrote one of his most beloved classics, “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.” What do these two pieces of writing have in common? A character based off of a real person. In “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer,” Becky Thatcher is the love interest of Tom, the book’s title character. Becky, a proud girl from a wealthy family, is actually based off of Twain’s real life childhood crush named Laura Hawkins. In the book, Becky starts taking a number of risks after getting to know Tom. The three most significant risks include breaking into a teacher’s desk to look at an anatomy book, following Tom into the cave during a picnic, and most importantly, falling in love with the not-so-model boy.
After some schoolyard drama and jealousy between Becky & Tom, Becky attempts to break into the schoolmaster’s desk to look at his anatomy book. She manages to do it but accidentally tears part of a page. The schoolmaster sees the damage the next day, but Tom takes the blame for Becky and gets whipped. Becky then realizes that Tom still loves her, regains her trust in him, and the two fall in love again.
Later on in
Overall, her greatest risk was befriending and falling in love with such a disobedient boy. Her father is a judge, so her wealthy family obviously holds a lot of power in the village of St. Petersburg. During the time period in which this book takes place, a high-class girl or young woman was supposed to associate with girls her age and possible suitors (who were typically equally wealthy or wealthier). Tom is neither of these, so Becky risks a lot of judgement from both from her family and the community. Sure, they’re just kids, but this was a different time and place. As far as we know, this risk was worth it, and Becky & Tom live “Happily Ever After” after the cave