Mark Twain's masterpiece, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, has over time created controversies commensurate with its extraordinary literary value. The story of an "uncivilized" Southern boy and a runaway slave traveling down the Mississippi River to freedom, Huckleberry Finn has been called offensive and vile since its first publication. At the same time, advocates such as Ernest Hemingway hailed it as the book from which "all modern American literature comes" (quoted in Strauss). Objectors have historically protested the novel for its racist content and have successfully banned it in many cases. Others believe the book is an essential part of the American literary canon and should be taught to all students. The dispute presented in this essay will not be resolved in the foreseeable future: both sides have legitimate and defensible causes. For this reason alone, I believe that The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn should be required in an 11th grade American literature course. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay At first glance, the objectors of Samuel Clemens' novel appear to engage in a simplistic level of discourse. Parents, teachers, and like-minded people have historically protested the novel due to the racism inherent in the material presented. Those concerned with racial issues find reason to ban the book because of the word "nigger," which appears in the text more than 200 times. Such detractors claim that, due to the overt racism presented, the novel increases racial tension, makes black students uncomfortable, and can corrupt impressionable minds. Furthermore, some found the book simply a crass story. Crusaders involved in one of the first bans on Huck Finn, undertaken by the Concord [Massachusetts] Public Library Committee, labeled the book "crude, crass, and inelegant, dealing with a series of unedifying experiences" and "the most real rubbish" ("Concordia"). Such basic criticism of Huck Finn typically draws from a one-dimensional reading of the work. The character of Jim is immediately portrayed as a grotesque and stereotypically unintelligent figure, and the novel itself ends with his capture and reenslavement. Huck, a naive boy with no morality beyond the flawed, inculcated Southern mores he takes for granted, tells the story from an unflinchingly simple perspective. If judged only on face value, this novel appears in fact to be nothing more than a dark commentary on race relations in the 1800s with predominantly racist undertones. Even Twain's most stubborn or narrow-minded critics, however, are able to grasp the basic elements of satire, sarcasm, and irony evident in Huck Finn. Twain was an ardent abolitionist and humanitarian despite the deeply ingrained Southern culture around him. He had no intention of dehumanizing blacks by depicting a sardonic reality any more than Jonathan Swift intended to advocate infanticide. Indeed, the real controversy surrounding Twain's novel does not simply lie in an objection to such a basic and cynical view of the work. There is a much stronger intellectual concern that lies at the heart of a modern controversy over how people should read and understand literary works. Furthermore, the debate extends to what should be considered part of the illustrious canon of "great literature," a distinction that most modern detractors would deign to grant Huck Finn. From aside of this conflict are the traditionalists, or formalists, who argue that the purpose of literature "is to rise above such local and transitory problems by transmuting them into universal structures of language and image" (Graff). These individuals reject subjective criticism of a literary work based on its ethical message. They instead believe that a work's literary value and merit are based on an objective analysis of the work's value as "art," which refers to a work's ability to describe, consider, or illuminate the human condition and compositional value of a work. By this standard, a literary work cannot be evaluated for the limitations of the time period from which it derives, just as "King Kong" might be considered an inferior film for its lack of computer-generated special effects or "Casablanca" for its lack of color. Traditionalists reject deliberation about the ethics of literature and are particularly opposed to censorship on ethical grounds. For them, it would be unfair to judge the Iliad for its reliance on myth, Lolita for its overt sexual situations, or the "Communist Manifesto" for its adhesion. of a radical doctrine. These works, traditionalists argue, have merits entirely independent of what erroneous, anachronous, or "unacceptable" beliefs or themes they appear to hold. Instead, their value depends on their ability to transcend such temporal constraints, an ability that is extremely questionable for any work of poetry or prose. Traditionalists, for the most part, believe in a distinction between literature and its physical effects. Because words have value regardless of their impact on the reader and their effect on the world, there must be a demarcation between words and their “real” consequences. Opponents of the traditional view focus on specific thematic and ethical messages within literary works in their analyses. Among their ranks are Marxist critics, who evaluate a work based on the class status and socioeconomic motivations of various characters; feminist criticism, which heavily analyzes gender roles and conditions in literature; and racial critics, who generally examine how a work deals with racial boundaries. These individuals actively examine the ethical messages of novels and consider how literary works impact readers with this message. The traditionalist and anti-traditionalist debate is at the heart of the controversy surrounding Huckleberry Finn. If all readers saw this book as traditionalists see it, there would be no objections. Jim's dejection is irrelevant to the literary merit of the novel. Reading the novel for its ethical message, however, places it on the same shelf as Mein Kampf for a racially sensitive reader. Jim's character and situation are reminiscent of the outdated and stereotypical roles of blacks. His position only serves to help cultivate the morality and civility of his white friend, Huck. Various writings reinforce this assessment of Jim as a character. Ralph Ellison compares Jim to a blackface minstrel, albeit a highly moral one. Toni Morrison attests to the necessity of Jim's role as inferior: "[This] portrayal...can be read as the white desire for forgiveness and love, but the desire is only made possible when it is understood that Jim has recognized his inferiority (not as a slave, but as a black man) and despises it” (56). Ultimately, Morrison argues, “It is not what it seems to Jim that deserves investigation, but what Mark Twain [and] Huck… have. need from him that should solicit our attention" (57). Others expressed their anger at the novel in similar terms: "It's not the word 'nigger' that I object to, it's the whole 1995.