Uncle Dan Essay, Research Paper

The uneven superstitious notions touched upon were all prevalent among kids and slaves

in the West at the period of this narrative & # 8212 ; that is to state, 30 or 40

old ages ago. Mark Twain Hartford, 1876 Covering with the function of thaumaturgy in HF,

Daniel Hoffman claims “ a elusive emotional composite binds together

superstitious notion: slaves: boyhood freedom in Mark Twain & # 8217 ; s mind. “ 1We know how

Twain felt about boyhood freedom & # 8211 ; his nostalgia for it lead him to some of his

finest authorship, and it lends its appeal to his most abiding plants, The

Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. How Twain felt

toward slaves is more equivocal. In his autobiography Twain wrote of “ Uncle

Dan & # 8217 ; cubic decimeter ” , the adult male on whom the character Jim was based, that his

“ understandings were broad and warm ” and that his “ bosom was honest

and simple and knew no craft ” ( Autob. , 2. ) To the clip spent on his uncle & # 8217 ; s

farm in Florida, Missouri Twain credited his “ strong liking for his [ Uncle

Dan’l ‘s ] race and & # 8230 ; grasp of certain of its all right qualities ” ( Autob. ,

3. ) To the late-twentieth-century reader, of class, Twain & # 8217 ; s intervention of inkinesss

is highly debatable. Jim & # 8217 ; s character nowadayss many troubles & # 8212 ; are we

to believe of Jim as the adult male who longs for his household even as he valorously runs

off from them or the sap who additions famous person among the slaves for a narrative he

invents and believes? How could Twain let Jim to asseverate his human self-respect on

the raft, so capable him to a series of gross humiliations at the Phelps farm?

Definitive replies to these inquiries are impossible. However they and the fact

that they must stay unsolved affect all decisions we draw about Twain and

his black characters. In sing superstitious notion, the 3rd portion of this

triangular relationship, we are once more left with inquiries about Twain & # 8217 ; s

feelings. In Form and Fable in American Fiction, Daniel Hoffman writes that

“ Twain & # 8217 ; s usual premise is that white individuals of

any position higher than

rubbish like Pap have small cognition of, and no belief in, superstitious notion ” 2

Superstition is chiefly for slaves and male childs. It is of import to observe that within

the model of Huck Finn, disassociating a thing from white civilization is by no

agencies projecting it in hapless visible radiation. In fact when put under the examination of Huck & # 8217 ; s

honest narrative, white civilization suffers severely. Miss Watson, though

“ good ” , is rough and unkind. The King and Duke think nil of

flim-flaming the Wilks girls out of their heritage ; even the Grangerfords, who

are “ quality ” , partake in a barbarous and deathly feud. The ferociousnesss

that Huck witnesses & # 8211 ; Buck & # 8217 ; s killing, Boggs & # 8217 ; slaying & # 8211 ; are committed by Whites.

Although Pap has superstitious notions, common people beliefs in the narrative belong to Huck and

Jim, the characters we most trust. While incidents like Jim imploring clemency from

the “ shade ” Huck and Nat and the enchantress pie are clearly intended to

do the reader laugh at the ignorance of the trusters, are we non someway left

in the terminal with the thought that the avid followings of superstitious notion are someway

safer than their Christian opposite numbers? In The Adventures of Tom Sawyer “ a

male child of German parenthood ” memorizes eight or ten thousand bible poetries but

goes mad from the attempt. In Huck Finn the Shepherdsons and Grangerfords go to

church with their guns. On the other side, the slaves “ come from all

about ” to see the five cent piece which they and Jim believe was given to

him by the Satan. We as readers know that the slaves have been duped by their

ain superstitious notion and by Tom & # 8217 ; s mischievousness, but are we convinced that they are worse

away than the people at the cantonment meeting who donate a sum of $ 87.75 to that

villain, the King, for his mission in the Indian Ocean?

1. Daniel G. Hoffman, “ Jim & # 8217 ; s Magic: Black or White? ” . American

Literature XXXII March 1960, pp. 47-54. back to text 2. Daniel G. Hoffman, Form

and Fable in American Fiction. Oxford University Press. New York, 1965.