THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN

Vocab List
CHAPTERS 1-16: 1) commence, 2) tolerable, 3) shrivel, 4) providence, 5) ingots, 6) oracle, 7) specimen,
8) infernal, 9) speculate, 10) hogshead, 11) vial, 12) pivot, 13) careened, 14) gaudy, 15) thicket.
CHAPTERS 17-29: 1) crockery, 2) reticule, 3) pensive, 4) impair, 5) pommel, 6) capered, 7) cavorting, 8)
scow, 9) lineal, 10) histrionic, 11) phrenology, 12) contrite, 13) sublime, 14) soliloquy, 15) yawl, 16)
pallet, 17) pone, 18) mesmerism, 19) frock, 20) passel, 21) rapscallion, 22) flapdoodle.
CHAPTERS 30-43: 1) dismal, 2) temperance, 3) venture, 4) bogus, 5) texas, 6) impudent, 7) insurrection,
8) garret, 9) inscription, 10) tedious, 11) brash, 12) ascend, 13) singular, 14) tapering off.

Huck Finn Reading Journal Topics

The picaresque hero
Archetypal structure/symbols (the journey, the river etc.)
Civilization (or lack thereof)
The moral struggle (personal v. societal)
The loss of innocence
Religion
Racism
Classism

Study/Discussion Questions
Chapter 1
1. With whom was Huck living at the beginning of the book?
2. Who is the narrator of the book?
3. What relation is Miss Watson to the Widow Douglas?
4. Who takes care of Huck and Tom's money?
5. Who was waiting for Huck Finn after midnight?
Chapter 2
6. To whom did Jim belong?
7. Who did Jim say gave him the 'five-center piece' he wore around his neck?
8. Who was called a cry-baby?
9.What was the "line of business" of the gang?
10. Who was elected Second Captain over 'Tom Sawyer's Gang?'

Chapter 3
11. Why did huck get a good 'going-over?'
12. How did Huck know that his 'Pap' waasn't drowned?
Chapter 4
13. Where did Jim get his hairball?
14. What made Huck suspect Pap was back?
15. Who is Pap?
16. Where is Pap at the end of the chapter?
Chapter 5
17. How did huck's unexpected visitor get in the room?
18. What did Pap trade his new coat for?
19. What did the judge recon a body would need to reform Pap?
Chapter 6
20. What did Pap get every time he got money?
21. What object did Huck use to escape the cabin?
22. Why does Pap not vote?
Chapter 7
23. For what did Huck dive in the water?
24. What did Huck drop "so as to look like it had been done by accident?"
25. What was Huck's destination once he was in the canoe?
Chapter 8
26. Why was the ferry-boat firing the cannon?
27. How long is Jackson Island?
28. What did Huck find that made his "heart jump up amongst his lungs?"
29. Why was Jim afraid of Huck?
30. Why didn't Huck believe that bees didn't sting idiots?
Chapter 9
31. How wide was the island?
32. What did Jim say that the little birds said?
33. Were they right?
34. How did the man in the house die?
Ch. 10
35. What did Huck and Jim find sewed up in the lining of an old blanket overcoat?
36. After Jim got bit by the rattlesnake, what did he have Huck do with the rattles?
37. Why does Huck think that Jim got bit by the snake?
38. What two objects did they find in the stomach of the catfish?

Ch. 11
39. Who is Sarah Williams?
40. Where is Sarah from?
41. What three ways did Mrs. Loftus ascertain Sarah's true gender?
Ch. 12
42. What is a tow-head?
43. What two items did Huck and Jim decide to NOT "borrow?"
44. According to Huck Finn, how much do steamboat captains make per month?
Ch. 13
45. What's the name of the wreck?
46. According to Huck Finn, how many wives did Solomon have?
Ch. 14
47. How many boxes of cigars did Huck and Jim get from the ferry-boat?
48. How did Louis the XVI die?
Ch. 15
49. Where did Huck lose the raft?
Ch. 16
50. What town were Huck and Jim looking for?
51. Why was Huck miserable?
52. How did the raft get destroyed?
Ch. 17
53. What was Huck's pseudonym?
54. How did Huck find out his pseudonym after he'd forgotten it?
55. How did Stephen Dowling Bots Die?
Ch 18
56. Who was Col. Grangerfords oldest son?
57. At what time was Miss Sophia supposed to have her rendezvous?
58. With whom did Sophia Grangerford run off with?

Ch. 19
59. Who wouldn't say, "dern the fog"?
60. The two men said that they were really
Ch. 20
61. How old was the imaginary boy named Ike?
62. How much did the King make at the camp meeting?

Chapter 21
63. What play are the duke and the king rehearsing?
64. What is the "most celebrated thing in Shakespeare"?
65. Who Killed Boggs?
Ch. 22
66. Colonel Sherburn says that the average man is a ____________.
Ch. 23
67. How much did "them rapscallions" take in in three nights?
68. Who does Huck say is Henry the Eighth's father?
69. Why did Jim feel bad about hitting his daughter?
Ch. 24
70. What was Peter Wilkes occupation while he was living?
71. Who are Peter Wilkes' three nieces?
Ch. 25
72. How much were the king and duke short of $6,000 in the basement?
73. Who told the girls the King was a fraud?
Ch. 26
74. Where did Huck hide to eavesdrop on the king and duke?
75. Where did the King put the money?
Ch. 27
76. Where did Huck stick the money?
77. Why was the dog howling in the basement during the funeral?
78. Whom did Huck say he had seen in the king's room? .
Ch. 28
79. To where was Mary Jane going for 4 days?
80. In what town did the duke and the king play the "Royal nonesuch"?
81. Who was the man with the broken arm?
Ch. 29
82. What did the king say was tatooed on Peter Wilkes breast?
83. What did Harvey Wilkes say was tatooed on his brothers breast?
Ch. 30
84. What does the duke say is the one smart thing the king did, the thing that saved them?

Ch. 31
85. At whose house was Jim when Huck came back to the raft?
86. How much did the king get for Jim?
87. How much was the reward for Jim?

Ch. 32
88. What is Silas' wife's name?
89. Who do Mr. and Mrs. Phelps think Huck is?
Ch. 33
90. Who was coming from town in a wagon?
91. What did the stranger do to Aunt sally that made her almost hit him?
92. What happened to the king and the duke?
Ch. 34
93. What two clues assured Tom and Huck that Jim was in the shed?
94. How did Tom and Huck finally decide to free Jim?
Ch. 35
95. What did Tom and Huck hear that made them stop talking about Jim's escape?
96. How many knives did Tom want Huck to "smouch"?
Ch. 36
97. What kind of pie did Tom tell Nat to make?
98. How many tallow candles did tom steal?
Ch. 37
99. Where do they keep the boots and rags, and pieces of bottles and wore-out tin things, and all such
truck?
100. According to Tom, from where did William the Conqueror come, and on what ship?
Ch. 38
101. What does "Maggoire fretta, minore atto" mean?
102. What was Jim to get instead of a rattlesnake?
103. What was Tom going to put in Jim's coffee pot?
Ch. 39
104. What did Tom and Huck see dripping from the rafters , landing on plates and down the back of your
neck?
105. What did Tom and Huck do with the sawdust?
Ch. 40
106. What happened that alerted the farmers to Tom, Huck, and Jim's presence?

107. What was Jim wearing during the "evasion"?

Ch. 41
108. Who went to get the doctor? Huck
109. Why?
110. Why didn't the dogs lead the farmers to Jim and the boys?
Ch. 42
111. How much did the doctor say a escaped slave like Jim was worth?
Final Chapter
112. How much money was waiting for Huck back home?
113. How did Huck's Pap die?

Literary Analysis
1. What elements mark Huckleberry Finn as a mythical or archetypal story? Does it follow the
elements of other genres, such as the picaresque?
2. In what ways does Huckleberry Finn attack romanticism and promote realism? In addition to
Tom Sawyer, what characters, scenes, or incidents contribute to this theme?
3. If we assume, as Twain says, that the novel celebrates the triumph of a "sound heart" over a
"deformed conscience," what are the steps in that process? Look closely at the relationship
between Huck and Jim. What incidents mark steps in Huck's moral growth?
4. Huckleberry Finn is celebrated for its style, especially Twain's use of vernacular speech and
dialect. Examine a short section of the book and explain what kinds of features (sentence
structure, irony, word choice, repetition, and so forth) he uses to achieve the effects.
5. What kinds of humor occur in the novel? Does Twain use humor for serious effects? What debt
does it owe to Southwestern humor? to understatement or irony? to set pieces of humorous
dialogue like the "Sollermon" debate?
6. Feminist critics such as Nancy A. Walker and Myra Jehlen contend that the female characters in
the novel are critical to Huck's growth. Jehlen singles out the Judith Loftus episode as the point at
which Huck becomes a person capable of saving Jim: "By plunging Huck into the deepest
possible limbo of identity," the episode teaches Huck to question the constraints of gender, and,
by extension, race. Are the female characters significant in this novel, or could they easily have
been omitted? What do they represent? Discuss.
7. Huckleberry Finn is in some ways a novel in which violence is mingled with entertainment. In
addition to its persistent mention of death and its motif of unburied bodies (especially those
floating in water), the novel shows Huck witnessing a series of violent episodes; he also describes
a number of entertaining spectacles. What connection exists in the novel between violence and
entertainment?
8. The ending of Huckleberry Finn, one of its most frequently discussed features, has been criticized
as abrupt, shallow, and unsatisfying. James Cox, on the other hand, defends the ending by saying
that we are Tom who "safely" frees the slave who is already free. Would you agree or disagree
with this characterization? Why?
9. Discuss Huckleberry Finn as a social satire. What classes does he satirize? What characteristics of
each class does he criticize?