18-307 HUCKLEBERRY FINN

18-307 HUCKLEBERRY FINN

Mike Carran, Thursdays 10 am - noon

Cactus Room, 10/4, 10/11, 10/18, 10/25, 11/1

Huckleberry Finn is as timely today as it was at the end of the Reconstruction Period when it was published.  In The Green Hills of Africa, Ernest Hemingway wrote: “All American writing comes from that [Huckleberry Finn].  There was nothing before. There has been nothing as good since.”  Yet the book was and still is controversial, originally because its narrator is the antithesis of a respectable boy and today because of its frequent use of racial epithets and stereotyping.  Banned from libraries when it was published and banned from some classrooms today, it remains a polarizing novel with some calling it a masterpiece and others calling it unfit to be taught.   We will examine why the book is considered a masterpiece, the controversy surrounding the book, its influence on American literature, and ask whether or not it should be required reading in schools.