Huckleberry Finn & Their Eyes Were Watching God
In Huckleberry Finn and Their Eyes Were Watching God the main characters of each novel, Huck Finn and Janie Crawford respectively, undergo a journey. Huck Finn is a young white boy in the South. Huck discovers the hidden reserves of strength inside him on a literal and figurative journey played out against the backdrop of slavery and racism. Janie Crawford also takes a literal and figurative journey. Her journey is similarly played out against racism and prejudice, one that demonstrates her growth as an oppressed African American female to a liberated, self-loving black woman. Both Huck Finn and Janie Crawford discover new depths of strength within as the outcome of their respective journeys. This essay will focus on their respective discoveries.
In Huck Finn, HuckÆs journey involves his experiences with the run-a-way slave Jim, a slave falsely accused. Huck wrestles with his conscience, believing at first it is his moral and social duty to turn Jim in to authorities. However, as his journey of self-discovery progresses, Huck comes to realize that he is not washed clean of sin as he thinks he is when he writes Miss Watson about the whereabouts of her slave. Instead, HuckÆs experiences with Jim and his moral and intellectual development cause him to question this stance. He realizes he has very valid and quite human emotions and feelings toward Jim. He understands he is ôthe best friend old Jim ever had in the worldö (Twain 209). By doing so, Huck is questioning the mainstream morality in his society in favor of a higher, internal morality of his own making.
In a similar manner, Janie Crawford questions the morality, prejudices and judgments of the mainstream society in which her journey unfolds. She does this with respect to attitudes toward African Americans as well as toward the female sex. Janie cannot accept the roles society, mostly men, have set upon her. ...