Tom Sawyer second post

Now that you are most or all of the way through Tom Sawyer, you have seen how important some of the other characters are. Often characters are important in one of two ways: they either show the reader something about the main character or they move the plot forward in some way—that is, something they do or some reaction that the main character has to them causes something new to happen in the story.

For this post, think about how some character other than Tom Sawyer is important to the book. Although you could do this with any character, I want you to use one of these three characters: Huck Finn, Becky Thatcher, or Injun Joe. Tell about the character, then tell how Tom reacts to this character—tell what sorts of things Tom does with and/or because of this character. Then give some examples of how that character affects the plot, telling which you think is the most important, or at least the most important so far in the story.

If you see that other people have posted on one character, post on a different one, so that we cover all the characters.

So that you have plenty time and access to the computers at school, I have changed the due date on this post to November 30.

Huck Finn third post

If you’ve been reading along steadily during the break, by now you should have come to the chapter that many people consider the climax of the book. This is chapter 31, called “You Can’t Pray a Lie.” In that chapter, Huck has an inner conflict, and it’s a very difficult one for him to solve.

Looking at this chapter, we see how Mark Twain uses humor to make a very serious point. It may be hard for us, reading this book over 130 years after it was written, to really understand Huck’s conflict. On the other hand, it may be easier for us than it was for the readers of the time to see how completely absurd the conflict is. Mark Twain meant for his readers to see that absurdity.

In this post, talk about Huck’s inner conflict in chapter 31. What is that conflict? Why is it a conflict? What does Huck decide, and why? Why does he think the way he does about this? What does he think he’s choosing by his decision? What is he really choosing? What do you think about this conflict? What do you think Twain’s readers at the time thought? What do you think Twain was trying to get people to think?

Twain uses the language of the time and of the characters, but of course we use the language of today, and we need to avoid offensive language.

To keep from having these posts repeat one another, I suggest that you focus on one or two of the questions and not all of them. See which questions have been answered in previous posts, and choose others, or respond to what your classmates say in their posts.

So that you have plenty time and access to the computers at school, I have changed the due date on this post to November 30.