Huckleberry Finn is not only one of the most widely known figures in American literature, but also one of most eagerly discussed. His creator has apparently succeeded in bundling him with the characteristics that readers are likely to find attractive. Practically an orphan, Huck is unprivileged, uneducated, and alone. An improper subject in the eyes of society, Huck’s naivete, innocence, his humble desires to simply live with a good heart, and his outsider status make him affectionate and valued. Most important, he is real. Twain’s use of colloquial and vernacular discourse through which Huck’s first-person narration is told immediately generates readers’ expectations of liberating difference in Huck and the novel. Yet, despite Twain’s highly original and notable achievements－stylistic experimentations, critical depictions of various facets of his society, and the exploration of interracial bonds－his fiction has been found to be disappointing to a number of critical and general readers. The argument is that Huck miserably fails in the “evasion” chapters, and that the ending of the novel thwarts the possibility presented earlier of the individual standing up against restrictive social rules and norms. This paper will argue for the need to understand Huck as a narrator and as a character in the novel. Although not suggesting a viable separation in these two capacities, I will suggest that Huck’s narratorial confidence and subjectivity jar with his personal struggles as a character in the novel. The remarkable correspondence between Huck’s voice and focalization－his language and consciousness－makes a convincing case for the autobiographical nature of the novel and for Huck’s impressive narratorial function. However, I consider how as a character more participatory in the story, Huck is at times at odds with the very attitudes he wants to project in his narratorial subjectivity. I thus propose that the suggestive inconsistencies in Huck’s narration and his participation in the story effectively subtend Twain’s subtle exploration in his novel, of the contradictory nature of American experience and the complexity of human nature and identity.
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