Nothing is simple about that “simple” boy, Huckleberry Finn – not even the text of the novel that bears his name. Less than twenty years ago, a lost manuscript of the book was rediscovered, and new editions include a chapter that was completely missing from earlier versions! If you’re interested in this part of Huck’s story, look at these modern editions:

Twain, Mark, Justin Kapalan (Introduction) and Victor Doyno (Foreward and Addendum). The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. New York: Random House, 1996.

Twain, Mark, with Victor Fischer, Lin Salamo and Walter Blair (Eds). The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, illustrated by E.W. Kemble and John Harley. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003.

Twain, Mark. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: Tom Sawyer's Comrade: Scene, the Mississippi Valley, Time, Forty to Fifty Years Ago, illustrated by E.W. Kemble and John Harley. Berkeley: University of California Press, c2001.

Huckleberry Finn seems so real that it’s hard to believe the book is 120 years old. Here’s a fine collection of essays published to celebrate centennial of the novel’s appearance:

Sattelmeyer, Robert and J. Donald Crowley (Eds). One hundred years of Huckleberry Finn: The Boy, his Book, and American Culture: Centennial Essays. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1985.

Two books that provide useful surveys of Huck’s reception by critics over the last 120 years are:

M. Thomas Inge (Ed). Huck Finn Among the Critics: A Centennial Selection. Frederick, MD: University Publications of America, c1985.

Twain, Mark, Gerald Graff, James Phelan (Eds). The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: A Case Study in Critical Controversy. edited by Gerald Graff, James Phelan. Boston, MA: Bedford/St. Martin's, c2004.

This work traces adaptations of the novel for movie and television screens:

Haupt, Clyde V. Huckleberry Finn on Film : Film and Television Adaptations of Mark Twain's Novel, 1920-1993. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, c1994.

The challenge of analyzing the novel’s treatment of race in mid-nineteenth century America has attracted wide attention. These books are a good starting point:

Chadwick-Joshua, Jocelyn. The Jim Dilemma: Reading Race in Huckleberry Finn. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, c1998.

Fishkin, Shelley Fisher. Was Huck Black? : Mark Twain and African-American Voices. New York: Oxford University Press, 1993.

Leonard, James S., Thomas A. Tenney and Thadious M. Davis (Eds). Satire or evasion? : Black Perspectives on Huckleberry Finn. Durham: Duke University Press, 1992.

Precisely because of its treatment of race, Huckleberry Finn demands special care when used in the classroom. These works help address the issue:

Johnson, Claudia D. Understanding Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: A Student Casebook to Issues, Sources, and Historical Documents. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1996.

Leonard, James (Ed). Making Mark Twain Work in the Classroom. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1999.

Rush, Sharon. Huck Finn's "Hidden" Lessons: Teaching and Learning Across the Color Line. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, c2006.

The story of Samuel Clemens’s creation of his masterpiece is almost as fascinating as the novel itself. These are good introductions to the story:

Doyno, Victor. Writing Huck Finn: Mark Twain's Creative Process. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, c1991.

Hutchinson, Stuart. Mark Twain: Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn. New York: Columbia University Press, 1999.

Steven Mintz, author of the essay you’ve just read, has written an excellent study of the evolving ideas of childhood and children in America. This book touches on many of the broader themes in the article in this issue. It’s no accident that the book’s title pays tribute to Mark Twain’s masterpiece:

Huck's Raft: A History of American Childhood. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2004.

Internet Resources:

On the web, your best bet is Stephen Railton’s “Mark Twain in His Times” website in the University of Virginia’s Electronic Text Center. This interpretive archive focuses on how "Mark Twain" and his works were created and defined, marketed and performed, reviewed and appreciated. To this end, the site presents dozens of texts and manuscripts, contemporary reviews and articles about Mark Twain, hundreds of images, and several interactive exhibits:

http://etext.virginia.edu/railton/index2.html

The segment on Huckleberry Finn is invaluable. Railton and his colleagues provide materials on the sources of the novel in Twain’s life and imagination, marketing methods used, samples of illustrations used over the decades in various editions, contemporary reviews of the novel, the use of “Huck” in Twain’s lecture series, special section on images of Jim, the treatment of race, class, and gender in Twain’s works. Once you get to this website, you may never leave:

http://etext.virginia.edu/railton/huckfinn/huchompg.html