Huck Finn Post #2

Huck Finn Post #2

Huck and Jim have grown very close over their time journeying together, and having been forming a relationship. They have come to depend on each other like a family, with Jim in the role of father, and Huck the son. This evidenced by how comfortable and happy Huck feels with Jim. At one point, Huck hears that the town is sending out a search party to search the island where Jim is hiding. He is seriously worried while Jim is in danger, saying, “I had got so uneasy I couldn’t set still.” (Twain p. 64). Huck has never had a real family before, and the idea that he could lose Jim, who has become his surrogate father figure, is a very scary idea for him. Huck is a very independent and street-smart person, but he is also an immature child, and Jim is an ideal balance for his immaturity. Huck also shows how important Jim is to him when he starts to share his knowledge with him, specifically literature. Jim cannot read, being a slave and having never had an education, and Huck reads to him from the books they found in the loot pile of the robbers on the shipwreck. Huck even tries, in his mind, to be patient with Jim, and humor him during their arguments, even though Huck looks down on Jim and all blacks.

It is even more evident in the behavior of Jim that he and Huck are close enough to be family. Jim worries about Huck whenever he disappears, he tries to keep Huck from making dangerous decisions and educate him with all of the “knowledge” he has. Jim’s care is shown by how he worries about Huck during many events in the story, such as the time when Huck gets lost in the fog. “Goodness gracious, is dat you, Huck? En you ain’ dead – you ain’t drowned – you’s back ag’in? It’s too good for true, honey, it’s too good for true. Let me look at you chile, lemme feel o’ you. No, you ain’t dead! you’s back ag’in , ‘live en sound’, jis de same ole Huck – de same ole Huck, thanks to goodness!” (Twain p. 87) is how Jim responds when he sees Huck again after believing Huck has drowned. He is as worried as if Huck was his own responsibility, as if Huck was his very own son. Jim also tries to pass off all the things that he believes are good knowledgeable onto Huck, namely the superstitions he most believes. Jim is trying to educate and prepare Huck for life as well as he would his own son, which shows just how much of a family the makeshift pair are. With Jim as the father figure, and Huck the son, the two are a better, and more real, family than Huck ever could have had with his own father.