Tag Archives: Huckleberry Finn
My Lie-Lay Conundrum

I realize that one sign of impending codgerdom is the urge to rant – or even write a letter to the offending newspaper – when you spot an egregious grammatical error in print. Where have all the hawk-eyed copy editors … Read more
My Indispensable Books

My last post talked about Ronald B. Shwartz’s compilation For the Love of Books, in which 115 writers revealed the three to six books that had influenced them the most. Naturally, I’ve been pondering what I’d say if assigned this … Read more
Call Me Huck

Writing my last post on Eudora Welty’s ideas about the importance of place in fiction got me to thinking. What if Huckleberry Finn had been born a New Englander instead of in a small town on the Mississippi? How would … Read more
On Bowdlerizing Huck Finn.

In America these days there are some words you never want to be called. Propagandist, censor, tax-and-spender, liberal – none of these terms are used in a positive way in our culture. In each case if you manage to pin the label on your opponent, your side wins the debate. Read more
Ras: Six Subversive Novels
A failure to communicate?