Ethan and I have been reading a lot lately. He wanted to read Finn, so to get ready we both ready The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. I hadn't read Huck Finn since college or maybe even high school, so it was such a pleasure! I had forgotten how compelling Huck and Jim's story was. I loved this book! On the other hand, I hated Finn. I knew that Pap was not likely to be a very pleasant or sympathetic kind of guy, but I found the whole book unnecessarily gruesome and violent and disgusting, and found myself unmoved, unchanged, and very disappointed in the end.
After finishing both of those books I decided I would like to go back to Mark Twain and read The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, which I had never read before. I loved this book also. It's a lot different than Huck Finn, but you know reading it that Mark Twain really remembered what it was like to be a young boy. It's full of adventures and was a delightful read.
Since I've had better luck lately with classics than new books, I've just started The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane. I was supposed to read this in high school - one of the Four Classic American Novels - but I'm ashamed to say, I never actually did. Sorry Mr. Sullivan!
1 comment:
Funny--Hillary just had to read Huck Finn for a children's Lit class she was taking and we were just talking about it. We both hated it. I think I hated it because I LOVED Tom Sawyer so much. I probably read that about 25 times as a kid.
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