Chapter 1-5 Timeline
- Chapter 1 - Aunt Polly and Widow Douglas take in Huck as their own and Huck explains his life.
- Chapter 2 - Huck hangs out with Tom Sawyer, and Jim is introduced when Huck trips as one of the slaves. The kids go on a boat to a large cave and Tom Sawyer introduces his gang where they rob and hold people for ransom.
- Chapter 3 - The gang broke up because there wasn’t anything happening.
- Chapter 4 - Huck goes to school to learn, and then gives the rest of the money he has to Judge Thatcher because he wasn’t sure what to do with it anymore.
- Chapter 5 - Huck’s goes to find his Dad but his Dad is sent to court and the Judge declares that Huck should be with his dad. Finally his Dad wants Huck to give him all his money so Huck gives him $3 which his Dad uses to buy liquor.
Time Period
- The time period is based around the 1800's when they still had slaves, and an older southern slang.
Narrators Perspective
- The Narrator is a younger more innocent person who describes things much differently than an adult would.
Chapters 6-11 Questions
- Why does Pap have Huck locked up? - Pap locked Huck up because Pap is drunk and doesn't like that Huck is attending school and learning to read and write.
- Create a visual of how Huck escapes The Shanty - Below
- Why is Huck concerned about being called a Ablitionist and what is it? - Ablitionist means that someone is wanting to end slavery which would obviously be a good thing now, but in the 1800's slavery was very popular so most likely people who condone slavery would dislike Abilitionists which is why Huck doesn't want to be known as one.
- Being able to throw the needle accurately but not being able to sew well, and the way he walked on heels.
- 3 things that would give away being a boy
- Voice
- Clothes worn
- 3 things that would give away being a girl
- Hair length
- Movement/Body language
Chapters 12-16
- What is the story of King Solomon and his child? How does Jim interpret that story? - King Solomon was a man with many wives and 2 of his wives claimed that one of his children were theirs. King Solomon suggested to cut the baby in half so that both wives could have a part of him. King Solomon immediately knew who the owner of the child was because one of the wives accepted cutting the baby in half and the other was completely against it. Jim interprets the story by helping the idea of having a full child because King Solomon has so many that he doesn't care.
- When Jim wakes up after their separation in the fog, what does Jim’s reaction to Huck tell us about him? How do you feel about Jim at this point? - Jim was extremely happy to see Huck because after the separation in the fog Jim had thought he lost Huck forever and that wouldn't be any good seeing that Jim sees Huck as a family member and they have a close bond. At this point I feel like Jim is a good person and obviously Huck sees that in Jim.
- Jim is very superstitious. From a historical standpoint, why do you think this is? - I think that Jim is so superstitious because in the time he lives in people were very racist towards blacks still and blacks didn't get treated the same and didn't even get an education. Almost all blacks were slaves and all were treated poorly so you can't blame him for being superstitious.
- “It was fifteen minutes before I could work myself up to go and humble myself to a black person – but I done it, and I warn’t ever sorry for it afterwards, neither.” What does this line tell us about - This is saying that Huck was sorry for telling such a joke and it took him 15 minutes before apologizing but in the end he did and he says I warn't ever sorry for it afterwards, neither meaning that he isn't sorry for putting himself up to say sorry showing that Huck isn't a bad person.
- At the end of chapter 16 Huck is struggling with giving Jim up. Outline the battle that he has with himself, and explain his actions when the men come up looking for the 5 escaped slaves. - Huck has a battle with himself giving Jim up because Huck and Jim have become so much closer even considering each other as friends. Huck struggles with giving him up because Jim is a black slave and back then it wasn't right for a white man to be friends with a black slave.
Chapters 17-21
1. Describe the Grangerford Family - The Grangerford family are kind people who are in a feud with the Shepherdson's and took Huck in as their own allowing him to stay whenever and Buck wanting Huck to stay forever so they can bond. Colonel Grangerford is the owner of the house and Huck and everyone else admire him. The Grangerford children include Bob, Tom, Charlotte, Sophia, and finally Buck.
2. Mark Twain alludes that the feud between the Grangerfords and the Shepherdsons is about traditional feuds between farmer (“granger”) and rancher (“shepherd”). Why would he write this into the novel? What does it say about these two occupations at this time (Chapter 18)? - It shows how people were back in this time. Our first little glimpse of the battle between them we see Buck attempting to kill Harney Shepherdson who is obviously a Shepherdson. Apparently the feud has been going on for quite some time but nobody really knows why they're fighting, they just know that 2 years ago 2 people died due to the family feud. The use of farmer grancher and rancher shepherd is a reference to back then when farmers and ranchers would get in fights all the time.
3. Toward the end of chapter 18 Huck says “I don’t want to talk much about the next day. I reckon I’ll cut it pretty short.” Huck says this prior to telling us about the big battle. How does our narrator’s perspective play a role in what we think and feel reading this section (Chapter 18)? - This quote quite clearly shows us that Huck isn't happy about the next day or he doesn't wanna think about the outcome. We can assume that something bad happened such as one of the Grangerfords dying, because he genuinely liked them. It would only make sense for that to happen because if the Shepherdsons were to have a casualty I doubt he would actually be angry about that seeing that he already is on the Grangerfords side.
4. Explain who the King and the Duke are. Why does Huck go along with their story (Chapter 19)? - Huck goes along with their story because King and Duke describe about themselves being big shots when they're nothing big. Huck quickly realizes they're frauds and liars but he doesn't want to cause any drama or fights so he decides to just go along with they're story praising them.
5. What problems do you anticipate with the Duke’s solution to how they can all run the raft during the day (Chapter 20)? - Duke's solution is to just pretend that Jim is their slave and they found him and are now taking him to his owner. They do this so that they can travel in the day time as well as the night time. I anticipate that Duke's solution will go poorly because if someone is to discover Jim and ask them what they're doing and they say they're bringing the slave to it's owner, the rumor will spread and then the owner will be expecting their slave back and when their slave doesn't come back it's gonna cause chaos and trouble with not just Jim but everyone on the boat.
Chapters 22-26
1. At the very end of chapter 22 we see the handbill that the king and the duke will pass out. The duke says “if that line don’t fetch them, I don’t know Arkansaw!” Why would the line at the bottom of the handbill work to get people into the play?
2. Towards the end of chapter 23 we see this line: “What was the use to tell Jim these warn’t real kings and dukes? It wouldn’t a done no good; and besides, it was just as I said; you couldn’t tell them from the real kind.” Why doesn't Huck see the use in telling Jim? What does Huck mean by "you couldn't tell them from the real kind?
4. In chapter 25 we meet the doctor. How does the doctor know that the king and the duke are a fraud?
- The line says "Ladies and children are not admitted" This would attract men because it allows more freedom for the men when their wives and children aren't around which allows for a "men's night off" with freedom of their wives not having a say in their decisions allowing them to do much more and do so more freely.
2. Towards the end of chapter 23 we see this line: “What was the use to tell Jim these warn’t real kings and dukes? It wouldn’t a done no good; and besides, it was just as I said; you couldn’t tell them from the real kind.” Why doesn't Huck see the use in telling Jim? What does Huck mean by "you couldn't tell them from the real kind?
- There was no use because Jim wouldn't understand what Huck was trying to say knowing he has less education and the entire reason they were doing this entire thing was to protect Jim from getting caught. When Huck said that "you couldn't tell them from the real kind?" he was referring to the King and Duke not being actual kings because of their personalities, traits, and actions.
- He was talking about when the King and the Duke made a plan to act as two rich brothers and Jim and Huck were their servants. The King and Duke wanted to sell the land and gain all the money from the dead brothers. Huck felt guilty and ashamed which is where the quote comes from.
4. In chapter 25 we meet the doctor. How does the doctor know that the king and the duke are a fraud?
- The doctor could so easily tell because their accents didn't sound good enough to be true. He knew that they definitely weren't the brothers and they definitely weren't related or didn't even know him personally. He wasn't 100% sure of who they were but he was sure that they were just posers.
- They considered leaving with the $6,000 dollars but then they thought about it and decided they were gonna stay until the rest of the land sold so they could be even richer and then they would leave.
Chapters 27-30
1. Why did people stay up with the dead during this time period?
- Back then they stayed up with the dead so that they could keep rodents off the body so whilst the body decayed. Back then this was a tradition since they didn't have anywhere to keep the body before the body was buried. The closest people to whoever passed away would stay overnight by the body.
- When we see Huck tell Miss Mary Jane that the slaves will see their family again, we see and learn about a whole new perspective of Huck. You can tell that Huck has evolved as a person and become a better person in general. Ever since Huck started going around with Jim we have seen Jim teach him so much about black people and we can see how Huck sees that black people aren't horrible and we also see Huck trying to protect Jim the entire way which shows a special point in Huck's heart.
- To try and identify who the brothers were and who the frauds were, they had all 4 men come and write signatures so that the townspeople could then compare the handwriting to the letters and it was easy to tell that the King and Duke were frauds. They got out of this by saying that the real William has a broken arm and therefore they can't prove who is who So the townspeople then tried to identify them by the tattoo on his chest which led to the King and Duke digging up the coffin finding money inside of it.
Chapters 31-35
1. Huck says “You can’t pray a lie.” What lie is he trying to pray about? What does he mean?
- This line is referring to when Huck is praying for Jim because Jim has been locked up as a runaway slave. At this point Huck is panicking and hoping that Jim finds his way back to Miss Watson but then he says "You can't pray a lie" because he doesn't actually want Jim back with Miss Watson, the entire point of him taking Jim with him was to free him from slavery and as of right now Huck has failed to do so.
- Huck is tearing up as he writes the letter to Miss Watson because he's revealing everything that's happened and where Jim is right now. The biggest reason he's tearing up is because the entire reason he brought Jim with him was to help Jim get out of slavery and Jim was considered a close friend to Huck at this point but now he's in a spot where he can't do much to help Jim and if Miss Watson finds him, she'll most likely take him back for slavery.
- I don't understand why Huck would be disappointed in Tom for helping him because Huck had asked Tom in the first place and if he didn't think Tom was gonna help or didn't think that it would go down like this then why did he even ask? I feel like this shows a good side of Tom Sawyer though.
- When Huck states that "Human beings can be awful cruel to one another" he's referring to when the King and Duke were being run out of town. Huck obviously felt bad for them but when he said "But that’s always the way: it don’t make no difference whether you do right or wrong, a person’s conscience ain’t go no sense, and just goes for him anyway.” he was trying to say that it doesn't matter that the King and Duke were treating the townspeople badly, the townspeople were treating the King and Duke with cruelty which is what Huck says when it's always the way and human beings can be awful cruel to one another.
- Tom, more specifically is wanting to look for a more difficult way because he loves an adventure so instead of having it easy, Tom wants to have a more difficult way since he loves running into problems and trouble. Huck on the other hand just agrees with Tom because Tom was willing to help Huck in the first place.
Chapters 36-40
1. In the process of breaking Jim free, what is Tom’s motivation? What is Huck’s motivation? (Why are they doing it?)
- Tom's motivation is him wanting an adventure and wanting to make something fun out of it because he's such an adventurous person. Huck's motivation is a lot different because Jim has become Huck's best friend and they had been with each other for quite some time and Huck is doing all of this in the first place just so that he can help Jim be free and they've made a friendship out of it.
- The only time I found "let on" was page 358 when Huck said "We let on it took nine months to make it" which makes me think that it means acted or pretended so it would be We pretended it took nine months to make it. I'm not positive why they would do this I can't find it out from the book, but I would think it's something to do with them being kids to pretend.
- Huck is writing letters so that he can let people know what he's doing, and he wrote an letter to his Aunt and Uncle's slave telling them what he's doing in hopes that they don't interfere with his plan to save Jim.
- It's satire because the Novel is making fun of how Tom is wanting to make the escape more difficult in a way. What I mean by this is that instead of doing it the easy way Tom wanted a more exciting and extreme escape plan so it's making fun of how people make things more extreme then they should be.
- I believe that Huck is trying to say that Jim is a good person. I think this because when Tom was shot he wouldn't leave for the boat until Tom got to a doctor and Huck most likely said "I knowed he was white inside" because Jim cares about them and back then people would say stuff like black men have no education, no heart, and are horrible people, but Jim is showing otherwise.
Chapters 41-End
1. Towards the end of chapter 41: “And then when I went up to bed, she come up with me, and fetched her candle, and tucked me in, and mothered me so good I felt mean and like I couldn’t look her in the face”. Why does Huck feel this way?
When Tom wakes up we learn that Miss Watson is actually dead. When Miss Watson died she freed Jim as a slave so that meant they were freeing an already free slave. This further shows us that Tom just loves an adventure and thrill. Tom clearly could've made the entire trip much easier but instead Tom wanted the adventure and thrill of the trip.
4. You’ve finished the novel: Tell me, in three to four sentences, what you think of Huck.
- He felt this way because he had lied to her about what they had been doing and why there were gone. He felt guilty about lying and obviously knows he shouldn't lie but what would've been the consequences if he were to tell the truth? If Huck had told the truth then she'd probably be mad.
- We can definitely see how Jim grows on Huck and Tom throughout the novel. Jim and Huck have been together for quite some time now and Jim now cares and loves both Huck and Tom. When Tom was shot Jim immediately was wanting to get Tom to a hospital showing that Jim cares about him even for the little time they've known each other.
When Tom wakes up we learn that Miss Watson is actually dead. When Miss Watson died she freed Jim as a slave so that meant they were freeing an already free slave. This further shows us that Tom just loves an adventure and thrill. Tom clearly could've made the entire trip much easier but instead Tom wanted the adventure and thrill of the trip.
4. You’ve finished the novel: Tell me, in three to four sentences, what you think of Huck.
- After reading the novel i've seen a lot about Huck. Huck is a kind loving person, at first Huck started off as you thinking of him as a kid you should feel sorry for because of how his life is with parents and such. But as the book goes on you learn about how Huck is kind and caring and you see this especially with Jim, who was black and back then being black isn't gonna go well for you. Even though Jim was a black man, Huck was willing to go all the way to help Jim get out of slavery and try to help Jim no matter what which formed a good bond between them showing us the kind side of Huck.