"I have no racial prejudices, and I think I have no color prejudices or caste prejudices or creed prejudices. In fact I know that. I can tolerate any society. Anything what I'm interested in knowing is that a man is a human being, that's enough for me, it can't be worse. Say no to plagiarism Get a custom essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? MARK TWAIN, Concerning the JewishHuckleberry Finn is the great American classic, a delight for the childhood imagination and a paradox for questioning adults. For many the novel is a masterpiece, a book that has been placed at the top of the "readers' choice list." , but for some, namely the curious minds within the literary circle, the novel has become a topic of endless debate, the gaming table in a game of intellectual domination 'beginning of novel, and perhaps enticed by it, hordes of writers have turned the pages of Huckleberry Finn and, in some cases, added more, in search of an underlying moral. In this essay I will join the ranks of other writers and pour my moral interpretation of the controversial classic into the pages. By bringing to light what critic James Phelan would call a "hidden text," I will demonstrate that Huckleberry Finn is a historical metaphor, representing the hypocrisy, naivety, and duplicity of the emancipation movement and its aftermath. Since I am trying to discover a "hidden text" in the novel, it is imperative to understand exactly what the phrase means. In his critical essay, On the Nature and Status of Covert Texts: A Reply to Brenner's "Letter to De Ole True Huck ", James Phelan describes the writer's desire to discover "hidden texts," or the hidden message, point, or moral code. in a narrative. For Phelan, this reader response mechanism, or attempt to discover hidden meaning, can be interpreted in two ways: "subversive" or "inventive". The "subversive" path towards interpretation is that of resistance, in which the critic questions the "meaning formed by the author"; creates additions to the text which, in turn, alter its original meaning. In my case, I have chosen the "subversive" path. Since its publication in 1885, many critics have taken up arms against Huckleberry Finn, questioning its credibility of the novel because of its racial implications. Kafka once wrote that if a book is "the ax to the frozen sea within us, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is not the axe; it is the frozen sea, immoral in its main premises, one of which humiliates black people and insults history" (342). ). While I must admit that the book certainly seems demeaning to black people, it definitely doesn't insult history. For all his bluntness, Huckleberry Finn managed to bring the horror of slavery to the surface; its meaning is wrapped in the form of an imaginative adventure for children. Anyone familiar with Mark Twain's political and moral views would know that he strongly opposed slavery, and his distrust of imperialist governments and aristocracies, as well as the meek and weak "poor whites," led him, in later years, to to question the entire human race. Mark Twain said in one of his memoirs: "It would not be possible for a humane and intelligent person to invent a rational excuse for slavery; yet you will remember that in the early days of the agitation for emancipation in the North the agitators got very little help or consent from anyone, arguing, pleading and praying, they could not break the quiet of the universe that reigned, from the pulpit and the pressto the bottom of society: the slimy stillness. created and maintained by the lie of silent assertion – the silent assertion that there was nothing that interested human, intelligent people." Mark Twain broke the silence by disguising literature written for "human, intelligent people" in the form of children's literature and fantasy fiction. It is not surprising that the book Huckleberry Finn created an elaborate metaphor for the historical period of emancipation: a satire of the naive abolitionists, the deceiver of the American Congress and the imperialist English. and hypocrites. In the novel, Huck embodies the Northern abolitionist movement. Like the movement in its infancy, Huck was a child, driven by ideologies and the desire for freedom. Huck was seeking freedom from the tyrannical grip of his abusive father and the ideologies that were forced upon him. Throughout the novel, Huck questions the lessons he learned from Christianity, school, and the imaginative imagination of his friend Tom Sawyer. The fact that he questions the established moral code of the time reflects the radical thinking of the abolitionist movement. Huck is a constant disbeliever and is not easily fooled by those who provide information that cannot be proven. For example, early in the book, Huck is fooled neither by the assumption that his father has been found floating dead in the river, nor by Tom's elaborate "thieves' game," which, according to him, "had all the signs of a Sunday school". (43). After Huck frees himself from civilization and all its constricting ideals, Huck heads down the river on his adventure, along with perhaps the only moral character in the novel, the slave Jim. Jim and Huck's run for freedom along the Mississippi, in the heart of the South, represents the abolitionist movement in the South. During their journey, Huck and Jim get separated many times; however, the incident in the fog around Cairo is the most notable one. In this scene, Twain shows the hazy areas that crept along the divide between the free states of the North and the slave states of the South. The fog is a metaphor for the dark ideology that occurred in the border states where many could not decide whether they were for or against slavery. Other obstacles stood in the way of Huck and Jim's quest for freedom, the two most notable of these being the Duke and the King, and the reemergence of Tom Sawyer at the end of the novel. In many of his other works and personal memoirs, including Following the Equator, Twain turns a cold shoulder to British aristocracy and imperialism. In his biography, Twain said, "There never was a throne that did not represent a crime." It is therefore not surprising that the two most despicable characters in the novel, the swindlers, hilariously call themselves Duke and King. Twain uses these characters to represent the British government. Historically, Britain was staunchly against American slavery; however, as Twain points out in Following the Equator, their actions against the natives residing in their African territories parallel the horrors of American slavery. Twain, speaking of British slavery, says: "This is slavery, and it is many times worse than the American one which so afflicted England." In the novel, the Duke and King, complete phonies and hypocrites, lead Huck and Jim to believe that they are allies to their cause and even help disguise Jim as an Arab. However, just a few days later, the Duke gives Jim the reward money. Twain introduced the Duke and the King to represent the artificial loyalty of the English to the abolitionist movement. The last point I will make, and perhaps the most important, is located.