Student Essay on Youth along the Mississippi

The two main characters throughout the novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain portray many great characteristics that a youth possesses and experience things that most youth often face. The first main character is Huckleberry Finn, a young boy who is living with The Widow Douglas and her sister, Miss Watson, who is trying to "civilize" him or make him to be what the perfect child should look like and make him act how the perfect child should act. Huck does not want that. He just wants to live how he wants, just like most youth want. His father is a drunk that was never around for him. Huck lacked a parental structure in his life, he just had surrogate parents. The other main character in the novel is Jim, one of Miss Watson's slaves. He has been a slave there for a while. Even though Jim is not a youth, he had many of the characteristics that a youth would possess. Like most slaves back then, this characteristic was caused by their lack of freedom. Mark Twain presented youthfulness throughout his novel, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and portrayed it through the actions of these two main characters.

Youth possess many characteristics. These characteristics stay with them throughout that stage of life. Youth is the stage of life after infancy and before adolescence and adulthood. Youth do not have a lot of freedom. They are allowed to play with their friends and go outside, but that is really it. Some youth do not even have those freedoms. When one is a youth their parents pick out their clothes, they have a bedtime, and they do what their parents say. Youth do not want to do all of that. They just want to have fun with a sense of rebellion. When one is a youth one learns a lot from parental models, with the difference between bad guys and good guys and right from wrong. One of the major things that youth want is friendship and companionship. Children cannot be alone. They need friendship; they have fun and adventure with their friends. Along with the fun and adventure, they learn from each other.

At The Widow Douglas' house, Huck was very safe and well off. She cared for him because he did not have real parents that cared for him. Like most mothers that want the best for their children, she wanted him to act perfect and look flawless. She wanted the best for Huck. She also wanted him to go to school and to church. Huck didn't want to change his clothes, look nice, or act mannerly. Huck wanted to play and have fun and adventure. Huck possessed that major youthful characteristic of fun and adventure with rebellion. At Miss Watson's house Huck had his friends. He had Tom Sawyer and his "robbers gang." That was his friendship and companionship. Youth need to have that. With his friends they all had fun together, they had imagination and adventure. Often these two major youthful characteristics go together. Jim lived at the same house with Huck, but he was a slave. Even though Jim was an adult he had one of the major characteristics that youth have because he was a slave. Jim had no freedoms at all. He had to do whatever his owner ordered or he would be punished. Jim was very similar to a youth who also have to do what their parents say, don't have that much freedom, and will be punished if they do not do what they are told. At The Widow Douglas' house Mark Twain gave the two main characters some of the primary youthful traits and portrayed their situations and actions as youthful even though both of them were not youths.

Huck being kidnapped by his father has youthful significance. People throughout their youth will have to face shocks like that. Everything will not go, as it should. After Huck had escaped he refused to go back and be "civilized" by The Widow Douglas. He wanted to rebel and to have adventure. As he went on his adventure down The Mississippi, he met up with Jim who ran away because he heard that he was going to be sold. When they came together they became the best of friends. They were real companions. They taught each other and had fun together. They had a relationship like all youth have with their friends. After Jim had escaped and did not have to be a slave anymore he acted more like an adult, like a father figure to Huck. It was being a slave that gave him youthful traits. Twain showed his transition from slave to human being by showing his youthful traits as a slave, and adult traits, which he was, when he was not under control. When the house floated by with the corpse in it, Jim did not let Huck see it. He protected Huck; Jim knew it would not be good for Huck, and that it was his father. He acted like a good father that Huck never had.

The companions met a lot of people on the river. One pair of people that they met brought out some youthful traits. They met The Duke and The Dauphin at least that is what they called themselves. They were con artists. They were what parents told their children were the "bad guys." They were the "wrong" that people will always face throughout their lives. Huck knew that Jim was not free yet, but he wanted to free him, that was what Huck was helping him do like a friend helping a friend. The con artists showed Huck that they were the bad guys. They sold Jim to the Phelps family, Tom Sawyer's Aunt and Uncle, telling them that a reward is being offered for him. While Huck and Tom were trying to help Jim escape, Tom was shot. Jim, knowing that Tom was one of Huck's best friends, sacrificed his freedom to nurse Tom. When they returned to the Phelps' house, Jim was made a slave again. The next day it was revealed to Jim that Miss Watson had passed away and she mandated that when she died, Jim would be set free. That event showed companionship between all three of them because Huck and Tom were trying to free Jim, even though Tom knew that Jim was free all along. They were helping each other like youth and companions do for each other. Jim also sacrificed his freedom knowing that he would be enslaved again by nursing Tom back to health. In the end, The Phelps offer to adopt Huck. Huck being acting like the youth he is and portrays, still does not want to be civilized. Huck just wants to have fun.

Throughout the novel Mark Twain showed the two main characters portraying characteristics of the youth stage of life. They portrayed these traits throughout the novel through their actions, situations, and interactions with each other and people that they encountered. They showed their friendship and companionship by helping one another. They experienced fun and adventure. In this novel youthfulness is a central theme throughout. It is evident that Twain wrote this novel from the heart for his expressions of youthful exuberance comes through in the identities in his characters.