African-American Voices
I just started reading Was Huck Black?: Mark Twain and African-American Voices by Shelley Fisher Fishkin, and I am already hooked. Fishkin argues that Huck's voice was influenced my two African Americans that Twain met in his lifetime. The author offers a wealth of research and glimpses of entertaining and enlightening articles that have been largely ignored for years. The few pages I have read so far today have made me want to go back and read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn again. Maybe in two years, when graduate school is over. I talk about its finish when, in reality, it has not even begun.
Note: I will add links to this post this evening.
posted @ 8/25/2004 12:43:00 PM Permalink
2 comments
2 Comments:
Mark Twain states in his Preface to "Huckleberry Finn":
"In this book a number of dialects are used, to wit: the Missouri negro dialect; the extremest form of the backwoods Southwestern dialect; the ordinary "Pike County" dialect; and four modified varieties of this last. The shadings have not been done in a haphazard fashion, or by guesswork; but painstakingly, and with the trustworthy guidance and support of personal familiarity with these several forms of speech."
Therefore, I'd say Black slave, Jim, was given "Missouri negro dialect" and Huck, the extreme form of backwoods Southwestern dialect. The relationship between Jim and Huck, and Huck's observations on Jim's plight are not as profound if Huck were black.
Dear Anonymnous:
The author is not proposing that the character of Huck was actually African American, but--despite what Twain says in his forward--his voice was directly derived from two African-American voices that Twain came across in his lifetime.
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