Categories > Original > Historical
Reviews
The Huckleberry Finn Controversy
(#) Larathia 2012-03-14
Here's a very important question you need to be asking yourself: would you be more offended if the white world not only never admitted there was a time when that word was totally okay, but in fact never learned that it had happened?
To understand how far you've come, black or white, it's important to understand where you began. Huckleberry Finn was written before the Civil War. And Huck's use of the N-word is in fact crucial to understanding the context of his story.
Racism hurts everybody. Not equally, but it does hurt everyone. Huck Finn is a KID. And, if you'll give the book a chance, you'll find that Huck's heart is nearly always in the right place and a fair guide to him, even when everything in his world and society tells him the opposite.
That's really ...kind of the entire point of the book.The Huckleberry Finn Controversy
(#) NirvanaCobain 2012-03-14
How has racism hurt white people? I don't follow. And what you said about how I might be "hurt if they hadn't mentioned slavery and how that word was just like saying 'Cheese' back then or never learnind about it is wrong. Whether whites want to blot it out or not we as African Americans would have know anyway through oral history. Cousin to mother to mother, father to cousins etc. The truth is like the sun. You can shut it out but it's not going away. Sure Huck's view on life may be positive but that word over a hundred years later still sting like a whip on our backs.The Huckleberry Finn Controversy
(#) lilgenious 2012-03-29
Alright, while I do have to admit that I hate that word as well and get uncomfortable with reading any book with the word in particular. You have to realise that the book was written before the Civil War, which viewed that word as okay to say at the time.
Also you really see Huck be really conflicted as he wishes to tell somebody about what Jim is doing (he wants to run away from the woman who plans on selling him for 800 dollars. You also see Huck become friends with Jim and go on an adventure with him... his views on slavery and people changes and continue to change throughout the novel. It's really the thought of the book that counts and not the word itself. While yes the word does have an effect on the story plot in general it actually takes centre stage for Huck's adventure with Jim.
I do not agree with you on the part that the novel is racist. It is just expressing human freedom during a time when some of what the book was talking about was frowned upon. Also racism hurts everybody. It isn't fair but during the course of this book it sets the reader on an adventure and tells a story of the cost of human freedom.
That is what Huckleberry Finn is about.The Huckleberry Finn Controversy
(#) CourtneylovesKurt105 2012-04-26
I strongly disagree with your statement about the 'N' word being removed. To me literature is literature nad if it can't be put in a book then you are going to say it aloud. As crude as it seems it was written during the Civil War. Whether it be cracker to beaner to nigger to Spongebob (Asian) it's really not tryin to target anyone. It would be down right disgraceful if they mentioned someone in particular. But overall, as much as I hate to type it, I feel like you are getting a little to over emotional, and this is based on a child who is angry and confused and growing up with idiotic adults.The Huckleberry Finn Controversy
(#) ficfriction 2013-01-12
I'd just like to point out what no one has said so far... Black people call each other that word all the time. "What's up my nigga?" "Yo nigga, come here!" Note: Black people only get upset when it comes from a non-black mouth. They can even tolerate it when it's being used by each other in the derogatory way, moreso than when it comes from a non-black mouth.
Granted, no one should really use it, but the word, due to its multi-use meaning, has lost a lot of its negative "powers". Only ignorant people get offended by the word being used in a book that was written before the Civil War, before it was deemed by society to be wrong to be used in a negative way anyway.
So, sorry to be rude and blunt, but get over the word, it'll probably still be around for a few more hundred years, if not longer. Don't clog up fiction site's with a whine about a book someone else wrote. Go on a blog and write your tangent there.
Sign up to review this story.