Satirist Mark Twain

Paper Summary:

This paper explains that Mark Twain used his humor to develop social commentary. Having grown up in the south and living through the era of slavery he witnessed significant social strife surrounding the institution and also surrounding the social stratification of the south, even among the roving whites of the region. The paper further explains that Twain's works, "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn", and "Puddn'Head Wilson" both offer the reader the opportunity to compare and contrast this foundational social commentary. This paper looks at how each work contains strong divergent characters, divergent and similar types of satire and each has a strong message about the character of both blacks and whites and the investment in a stratified social order.

From the Paper:

"The component of blacks in each novel was essential to satire and to the development of the character of the communities as contradictory. In Huckleberry Finn the character Jim is a great example of the similarities the boy's felt to black people. As black people were, being in the background, like children, aware of the contradictions that were lived in the white world. Jim has a fantastic sense of the idea that nothing is as it seems and this is a fact that binds him to the young band of robbers."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Twain, Mark. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. New York: P. F. Collier & Son, 1918.
• Twain, Mark. Pudd'nhead Wilson; Those Extraordinary Twins; The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg. Ed. R. D. Gooder. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992.

More papers on Satirist Mark Twain:

• Essay # 10460 : "Twain, Mark"
• Analytical Essay # 122887 : "Mark Twain's "The Prince and the Pauper"
• Essay # 36188 : "Mark Twain"

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