Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn Is Published
Mark Twain's *The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn* was first published on February 18, 1885, by Charles L. Webster and Company, and quickly gained recognition as a pivotal work in American literature. The novel serves as a sequel to *The Adventures of Tom Sawyer* and portrays the journey of a young boy, Huck Finn, and a runaway slave, Jim, as they travel down the Mississippi River. Through its use of vernacular language and commentary on social issues, the book is celebrated for its realistic depiction of life in the pre-Civil War South. Despite its acclaim, *Huckleberry Finn* has faced considerable criticism and controversy, particularly regarding its language and themes of race, leading to its frequent challenges and banning in various educational institutions. Initial responses to the book were mixed, with some reviewers praising its depth while others condemned its content as crude. The novel's legacy continues to spark debate and is frequently included in discussions about race relations in America. With tens of millions of copies sold and translations in over 70 languages, *Huckleberry Finn* remains a transformative piece of literature that reflects both the complexities of its time and enduring societal issues.
Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn Is Published
Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn Is Published
On February 18, 1885, the first edition of Mark Twain's masterpiece of American literature, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, was published by Charles L. Webster and Company. It was an instant success in both the United States and around the world and has been praised as the definitive American novel. It has put an indelible mark on the course of American literature, so much so that Ernest Hemingway, in The Green Hills of Africa (1935), wrote that “all modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain called Huckleberry Finn. . . . There was nothing before. There has been nothing as good since.”
Mark Twain was born Samuel Langhorne Clemens in Florida, Missouri, on November 30, 1835, and after a long and successful career died on April 21, 1910, in Redding, Connecticut.
Huckleberry Finn was the sequel to The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876), both books portraying the American South prior to the Civil War. In it a young boy named Huck Finn takes a trip down the Mississippi River with his companion Jim, a runaway slave. Huck's tale is spiced with Twain's social commentaries and with the use of common dialects, often including vulgar language. By abandoning formality and emphasizing authentic dialogue, combined with a realistic portrayal of life on the Mississippi River during the days of slavery, Twain produced a classic of American realism.
Despite the status Huckleberry Finn has attained in the canon of American literature, public opinion of the book has always been mixed. Critics in both the United States and Britain who normally received Twain's work favorably gave the novel positive reviews upon its first publication, but many others criticized it heavily. In 1885 the Boston Evening Traveler (March 5) called it “senseless,” while the San Francisco Daily Examiner (March 9) wrote that “there is little to be said in the book's favor.” The Concord (Massachusetts) public library caused a sensation when its librarians voted to ban the book from its shelves within a month of its publication, not so much on moral grounds but because it was “rough, coarse and inelegant, . . . suited more to the slums than to intelligent, respectable people.” This decision prompted responses from across the nation, from the Hartford Courant (March 18), which suggested the notoriety would increase sales of the book, to the San Francisco Chronicle (March 29), which called the library's action “absurd.”
It may surprise many 21st-century readers that the book's portrayal of racial relations was largely ignored until two decades after the novel's publication, when a reviewer briefly referred to it as an “antislavery tract.” Then, after Twain's death in 1910, the African American educator Booker T. Washington noted the positive portrayal of Jim in the story which, he said, “exhibited [Twain's] sympathy and interest in the masses of Negro people.” Due to its depiction of black-white relations, along with its use of colloquial language, Huckleberry Finn continues to be a lightening rod for controversy. It still appears on banned book lists assembled by schools and other organizations around the United States. As conservative and religious groups gained increasing political power in the United States during the latter decades of the 20th century, they often used their influence at the state and local level to ban Huckleberry Finn for its profane and irreverent language, including its liberal use of the word nigger. At one point even the Mark Twain Intermediate School in suburban Washington, D.C., had this book by its namesake removed from its shelves.
Tens of millions of copies of Huckleberry Finn have been sold worldwide since its first appearance in 1885. Along with Twain's other works, the novel has been published in over 50 countries and in more than 70 languages.