The Adventures Of Huckleberry Finn: A Great American Classic About the Quest for Freedom (Collins Classics)

This is a reproduction of the original 1885 illustrated Adventures of Huckleberry Finn 1st edition. You cannot adjust the font size or type so the print is very small. It is just like reading the original book with all the original illustrations in the right places. I wear specs and found it was not a terrible inconvenience at all. The thing to keep in mind is when the book was written and the subject matters. There is much use of the 'N' word and matters involving slavery, but this is part of the story. The writing is Mark Twain at the height of his storytelling powers. The narrative is told through the person of Huck Finn. The characters shine through and each written conversation is in the character's own dialect. I was thoroughly entranced by the amazing and various adventures involving Huck on his journey throughout the book. The illustrations added to the enjoyment. I will not refer to any part of the storyline as I always think this is better for the reader to discover without any spoilers.

Ashamed to say that I had reached my 60s before actually reading the whole of Huckleberry Finn (after having read Tom Sawyer, also for the first time, and you do need to have read that first). I hadn't realised how good a story-teller Mark Twain was, and if you haven't already done so I would thoroughly recommend them to you. OK, the world is rightly more politically correct now and you have to remember the culture that Twain was writing into, but even this is something of an eye-opener on the white-black divide in Mississippi at the time, but with a good deal of humour mixed in. The story requires you to suspend reality checks to some extent; for example, Huck is totally uneducated and in his early teens, but seems to have an excellent grasp of the geography along the river; perhaps he had just hitched rides on the riverboats and kept his ears open. Unlike 'Tom Sawyer', this book is written in first-person and with phonetic spelling; you just have to read with a Deep South accent! The loss of one star is for the Kindle version, which had an irritatingly large number of words joined together - e.g. 'I tellyouifI catchyoumeddlingwithhimagain' - which you become surprisingly quick at decoding but was a bit wearing. If you've not read it - now's your chance.

Great purchase

This is a really entertaining read that gets better and better the further you get into it, and becomes hilarious once Tom Sawyer arrives on the scene towards the end. My understanding is that this book was removed from being taught in school on the grounds of racism, which I find utterly bizarre. It is true that throughout the book slaves are referred to using the n***** word, which is obvious distasteful. But the book is a reflection of its time and this word is primarily used by white people to illustrate their bigotry and ignorance. Throughout the book slaves are portrayed as altruistic, considerate, warm-hearted and family orientated, whilst all the fraudsters and violent drunks, including Huck's father, are white. That aside, this is a very funny book in which Huck gets into all kinds of scrapes along with Jim, a slave he is trying to free. Personally I found Tom Sawyer the most engaging character despite his late appearance. Indeed, Tom and Huck as a double act come across as a childish precursor for the likes of Morecambe and Wise with Tom and as the daft Eric and Huck as the straighter Ernie. I wonderfully entertaining and occasionally thought provoking read.

A very nicely produced edition of this classic story - although ,unfortunately, the first page of the 'Chronology' is missing! Regarding the story itself, there is a problem for the modern reader relating to some unduly racist language. Nevertheless, the story unfolds in an interesting way until it reaches the final chapters which are a real disappointment. It's as though the writer lost interest - sadly, so does the reader.

I totally didn't know what to expect with this book after reading tom sawyer. but this is even better! It amazed me and surprised me about the adventures. A really good insight into what life was like back then, though author says there is no moral, it seems to have a lot of modern outlook to me, pointing out the unjust treatment of slaves, trickery of con men, strange ways of town folk, dangers of small minded villagers, and all the time centring around the innocence of boyhood, young male outlook, the inner teacher a boy can follow, the kindness and judgement he can learn to develop. OK, there is a repeated word, not used today, and offensive to people of African origin beginning with 'N', I daren't quote it here. However, it was used as in the original text and is correct in its historical usage. Be aware if passing this onto a child and decide for yourself how they may take on board or understand about this aspect in the language. but otherwise a great book. came on time.

An enjoyable classic, particularly liked it when Huck says "Jim said bees wouldn’t sting idiots; but I didn’t believe that, because I had tried them lots of times myself, and they wouldn’t sting me."

Arrived promptly New, but the downside is the print is very small

Produit arrivé un peu en retard, mais très bel article, la couverture est juste magnifique, le livre en très bon état Je recommande

Man sollte das Buch auf jeden Fall im englischen Original lesen, da große Teile in verschiedenen, sehr unterhaltsamen Südstaaten-Dialekten geschrieben sind. Und auch wenn die Handlung, ohne vorher Tom Sawyer gelesen zu haben, verständlich ist, die Charaktere bereits aus Tom Sawyer zu kennen, fand ich beim Lesen schon von Vorteil. Und wenngleich es aufgrund der Abenteuergeschichten als Jugendbuch gilt, ich hab's nun erst mit 28 gelesen und bin überzeugt, dass das Buch Leser jeden Alters fesselt. Hab mir danach gleich 3 weitere Bücher von Mark Twain besorgt und kann alles von ihm als außerordentliches Lesevergnügen wärmstens empfehlen!

Reading the work becomes richer thanks to the explanations that precede the main text.

Mark Twain like many great American authors had a distinguished career in the literary industry. This novel comes at the time when the great civil war that ripped the United States into two had come to a close. It was the time when all the emancipated slaves from the south started migrating towards the north and the States started a westward expansion. This story is a realization of present problems and prejudices stilling plaguing in the society. At the start, Twain gives us a joke that the one who tries to find the plot will be killed. It’s an amazing start to the novel. This novel is a grand picture showing us a very broad cross-section of society and its prejudices. “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn”, has now become one of my favorite novels. I read a random line by Ernest Hemingway which said - “This is where the American Literature starts, nothing was before and nothing is as significant since.” Which made me pick up this novel. When I read this novel, I realized that he wasn’t kidding at all. Twain is a genius in putting the tropes of childhood, innocence, growing up, society, and slavery in a single book and binding it through the river. This book is where that little Huckleberry Finn who was the sidekick of Tom Sawyer from The Adventures of Tom Sawyer gets the lead role in the story. Huck’s journey from being naïve to growing up emotionally with the runaway slave Jim, serene beauty of the Mississippi, and the cruel pre-civil war American south keep us locked into the book. This is one of those Great American Novels, the real transcendentalist thought that Emerson, Thoreau, and Whitman believed in. But the effort of the reader to find the American character in Huck in the context of a tragedy is heartbreaking for everyone. This book is in every way comparable to Don Quixote, and you will even enjoy reading that too. The two most interesting things in this novel are the usage of first-person perspective contrary to its prequel, which makes it way more immersive and dramatic, and the usage of the ‘n’ word. We again here need to understand that Twain is writing for an audience at his time in the local dialect when the word was commonly used. The ending somewhat makes everyone surprise. I liked the way Twain played the game towards the end but not many may like it. Twain again showed that Tom is always the boss in his friends. This book makes you get bored, fell in love with the characters, laugh with them for Twain’s amazing literary humor, get emotionally connected with them, cry alongside them, and in the end close the book exclaiming how a book can be so beautiful. The book contains every conflict and debate in today’s world. This is contemporary, though not by times but by the societal prejudices. This can be in contention for what America might call a national epic even though it ain’t a poem. This book isn’t a onetime read at all. Do give it a read. You won’t be disappointed. From one angle, it’s a tale of an adventure to find freedom, for Huck it is freedom from civilization, and for Jim, freedom from slavery, it is a picture of a world of prejudices; it is a drama of moral conflict. A world which is filled with smugness, illiteracy, boredom, anarchy, prejudices, bravery, cowardice, and brutality. I would like to conclude by saying that this is a book which contains humor about a completely opposite world.

The edition is OK, but very small letters, probably not good for small child.