Shirly Ong
English 48B
25 January, 2008
Journal #8 Mark Twain
Quote:
“Don’t put your feet up there, Huckleberry”; and “don’t scrunch up like that, Huckleberry—set up straight”; and pretty soon she would say, “Don’t gap and stretch like that, Huckleberry—why don’t you try to behave?”
Summary:
This is what Miss Watson said when she was living with Huck.
Response:
The Widow Douglas and her sister Miss Watson are from upper class of the society. Instead, Huck grew up without parents. He hangs out with Tom and has adventures with Tom. He did not have a proper home. He did not receive proper education neither. From this conversation, we can see that Miss Watson is trying to “sivilize” Huck. She thinks Huck should behave better. She wanted him to behave like a boy from the upper class. However, Huck did not like to act like that. When he got into his old rags, he was “free and satisfied”. In other words, he enjoys his life without a proper home. He feels he was restricted when he was living with Widow Douglas. Even though he can get new clothes and a good place to live, he dislikes this kind of life.
These quotes also reflect the significant gap between upper and lower class in the Missouri society at that time. Miss watson wanted Huck to behave because she thinks the upper class was more distinctive. They could not act like people in the lower class. Indeed, I think this phenomenon still exists in the current society. For example, rich people tends to buy clothes from famous brands. They also tend to send their children to private school so that they can be more distinguished. To me,a society will be more peaceful if the gap between the rich and the poor is smaller. Therefore, instead of starting wars or fighting on political issues, helping the poor should be the governments' first goal.
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1 comment:
20/20 I think what you're missing here, at least from a typical American perspective, is that most of us identify most strongly with Huck's discomfort. So Twain is basically mocking the stiffness and over-formality of upper-class social conventions. I say this is "American" in the same way that so many of us wear blue jeans and avoid wearing suits and ties. To some degree this is a very informal culture, with more "working class" values at some times.
This and a few other journals tend to end with an independent statement of your own beliefs -- one that it is bit distant from the work at hand. So keep tying things back to Twain even more closely if you can.
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