1. The Historical and
Cultural Context of
Adventures of
Huckleberry
Finn
by Mark Twain

2. Historical Context of
Huckleberry Finn
Set in pre­Civil War years
40­50 years before 1885 publication
Slavery ended, but racism still
rampant (Jim Crow Laws)

3. Mark Twain underwent moral
transformation…
 He believed slavery was wrong
and white Americans owed
black Americans reparations

4. 19
CENTURY
th
The Civil War
Industrial Revolution
Extreme contrasts
between rich and poor

5. Literary and Artistic Movements:
REALISM and REGIONALISM
1. Attack upon Romantics and
Transcendentalists
 pragmatic, democratic, and
experimental
Responsibly moral – goal was to
report the world with HONESTY

6. 2. Drew subject matter from
“our experience”
Focused on the common,
the average, the probable

7. 3. Character and Setting more
important than Plot
(Local Color Movement)
Focused on the norm of
daily experience
Dialect, geography,
regional manners

8. HUCKLEBERRY FINN is
a…
COMING­OF­AGE NOVEL: moral growth o
a comic character in an physically beautiful
yet morally repugnant setting

9. and a…
PICARESQUE NOVEL: follows the
adventures of a roguish hero
• episodic: Mississippi River
• flight to freedom vs. river flowing
toward Deep South (slave territory)

10. 19th century Americans are
self-conscious…
They want to know what their
new country looks like, and
how the varied races of growing
population live and talk

11. 19 century
Firsts…
th
First mappings of the West
First transcontinental railroad
First Photography

12. Photography as a
social mirror…
The invention ignited an artistic and
scientific frenzy…
Best portrait makers could bring out
the very human essence of a
subject…
The advantages of photography:
immediacy, reliable representation,
low cost, etc…

13. Massive social changes reflected in
literature & photography.
1861­65 ­ Mathew Brady,
Alexander Gardner: honest
photographic record of the Civil
War.
Photography, like literary Realism
& Regionalism
showed TRUTH.

14. “Something new happened in
Huck Finn that had never
happened in American
literature before. It was a
book…that served as a
Declaration of Independence
from the genteel English
novel…

15. …[It] allowed a different kind of
writing to happen: a clean, crisp, no­
nonsense, earthly vernacular…it
was a book that talked. Huck’s
voice, combined with Twain’s satiric
genius, changed the shape of fiction
in America, and African­American
voices had a great deal to do with
making it what it was.” ­ Dr. Shelley
Fishkin, 1995

16. Comparing VIEWPOINTS OF SLAVERY in…
Huckleberry Finn
Photograph
•

17. #1
"Slave Boy
Brought to
Waterbury from
Bucks Hill by
Aunt Ella
Johnson's
Second
Husband
(Whelan)"
Ninth-plate
ambrotype,
circa 1855
http://www.phot
ographymuseum
.com/slaveboylg
.html
The American
Photography
Museum, Inc.

18. #2
"Our Little
Pedlars"
Quarter-plate
ambrotype, circa
1855-1860
http://www.photo
graphymuseum.co
m/pedlarslg.html
The American
Photography
Museum, Inc.

19. #3
W. Queen (Philadelphia),
Publisher or Retailer:
"The Darkey's Vanity"
Tinted Albumen Stereograph
circa 1860
http://www.photographymus
eum.com/vanitylg.html
The American
Photography Museum,
Inc.

20. #4
Cumberland Landing, Virginia,
Group of "contrabands" at Foller's house, May 14, 1862
http://memory.loc.gov/learn/lessons/psources/slavpho2.html
The American Photography Museum, Inc.

21. #5
Unidentified Photographer:
Civil War Soldiers with a "Contraband"
Albumen carte de visite, circa 1863
http://www.photographymuseum.com
/contrabl.html
The American Photography Museum, Inc.

22. #6
E. & H. T. Anthony & Co.
(New York), Publishers:
"Bombproof Quarters of
Maj. Strong, at Dutch Gap,
16th N. Y. Artillery"
Albumen Stereograph circa
1864
http://www.photographymuseum.com/majstrong.html
The American
Photography Museum,
Inc.

23. Unidentified Photographer:
Ten Children
Cyanotype, circa 1898
http://www.photographymuseum.com/cyanokidslg.html
The American Photography Museum, Inc.
#7

24. #8
Palmer (Tuskegee, Alabama)
Instructor & Three Graduates with Diplomas and Geraniums
Gelatine-Silver Print, circa 1905
http://www.photographymuseum.com/tuskeglg.html
The American Photography Museum, Inc.

25. Works Cited
The American Photography Museum, Inc. Virtual Exhibit: “The Face of Slavery and Other Early
Images of African Americans.” (2004). http://www.photography-museum.com/faceof.html
Cross, J.M. . “Nineteenth-Century Photography: A Timeline.” The Victorian Web. (2001).
http://www.victorianweb.org/photos/chron.html
Reuben, Paul P. “Chapter 5: Late Nineteenth Century: American Realism - A Brief Introduction.”
PAL: Perspectives in American Literature: A Research and Reference Guide - An Ongoing
Project.(2003). http://www.csustan.edu/english/reuben/pal/chap5/5intro.html
Rubio, Juan Carlos. (Curator). “Portraits and Landscapes in Nineteenth Century Photography. Private
Collections of Madrid.” Fundacion Telefonico. (2001).
http://www.fundacion.telefonica.com/at/photoes/efotoxix.html