Feeling Talkative

Mr. Twain, do you believed niggers had red blood? Or that the Duke and the King had blue blood?

In every conversation between Huck and Jim I found out the differences were notable.

Niggers will never learn to argue, apparently. He would go on and argue that a Frenchman must talk like an American, and not differently. Then, is Jim being insulted, or is it just minstrel show?

So they say it’s a manner of comedy. And pages before this Frenchman episode, I was LOL while poor Jim suffered with the snake bite. Yeah, poor him, but it made my day!

There I was reading “Jim sucked and sucked at the jug, and now and then he got out of his head and pitched around and yelled; but every time he come up to himself he went to sucking at the jug again” (Twain 65).

Remembering Don Quixote while I read it. When the reader enjoys the suffering of a character, its grotesque. Then, is Twain being grotesque in Jim’s snake bite, or the Duke’s and King’s torment when the money bag disappeared?

Enacting a version of minstrelsy, Mr. Twain, you guide the reader through your story, and make him understand it. Entertainment is the key.

Living the story is better than reading it. The dialogue, and the contrast between Jim’s accent with that of Huck makes it a good experience for the reader. Makes him live the Minstrel Show.