Readers learn that Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn, from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, is characterized by Twain’s use of foils, dialogue, and description of Huck as a young boy who is driven by his desire to escape his current state, emotions, and family. Huck is seen as a young boy, about thirteen. He lives in Mississippi, during times of slavery. His setting also helps show his upbringing and the desire to change his future.
Twain uses a foil between Huck and Tom Sawyer to emphasize the differences between them. Tom is a very dark young man with emphasis on the satirization of the romantic side of literature during this time. He is very much by the fictional “book” (7) about becoming robbers, whereas Huck is very skeptical. “’Must we always kill the people?”’ (6) Huck asks, as he questions Tom and his motives. Huck is very curious and interested to find out new things, yet still has a strong sense of reality compared to Tom. Although Tom and Huck are very much strong foils, to keep them linked throughout the novel, both boys share a love for the boyish and adventurous lifestyle. They like to go out on late night adventures together, take oaths together, and have a love for the unknown.
Dialogue is another strong tool that Twain uses to characterize Huck. When Huck sells his fortune to the judge, his age, insecurity, and desire to please are very apparent, “Please take it…and don’t ask me nothing-then I won’t have to tell no lies” (12). Besides being young and immature, Huck has a very strong sense of being clever and quick-witted. He seems to always have an answer for the situation he is in. After Pap asks what Huck is doing with the gun on page 22, Huck immediately replies with, “Somebody tried to get in, so I was laying for him” (23) which kept him out of the wrath of his insane, drunken father. Dialogue proves that Huckleberry is very much of an emotionally driven, clever, and quick-witted individual for his age.
It is obvious that Huck is from...