ry Finn. By this time, they have matured enough to handle the mature nature of this book and have the ability to read it objectively. Also, in high school, teachers focus more on theme and interpretation of writing instead of focusing on just the plot. This allows the teachers to explain the satire in Twains writing, and helps the students understand the meaning of the vulgarity in the characters.In Twains novel, Miss Watson, Huck Finns caretaker, owns Jim. She discovers that selling Jim could put $800 in her pocket, making her think of Jim merely as property. Booker T. Washington when defending Huckleberry Finn in the North American Review, Before one gets through with the book, one cannot fail to observe that in some way or other the author, without making any comment and without going out of his way, has somehow succeeded in making his readers feel a genuine respect for Jim, in spite of the ignorance he displays. I cannot help feeling that in this character Mark Twain has, perhaps unconsciously, exhibited his sympathy and interest in the masses of the Negro people.As Washington said, Twain desired sympathy and compassion with the Negro people, so he created events and words of vulgarity and cruelty to emphasize this. Huck Finn plays a trick on Jim, causing him to believe that he dreamt about separation from Huck on the river during the fog. This upsets Jim greatly, so he refers to Huck as trash, saying that people who play tricks on their friends to make them feel ashamed are all trash. Huck feels extremely apologetic for doing something like that to Jim, his one true friend (90). Jim may not have known much, but he understood the importance of friendship and trust, and honesty. Yet people, during the period before the Civil War, overlooked slaves humanity, turning them simply into hands and laborers. Twain used this passage to show a young, innocent boys realization that Jim, a black slave, possessed a great humanity abou...
