Was Huck Finn Black?

So who was Huckleberry Finn anyway? The most celebrated hobo hero in American literature took on a new dimension when Shelley Fisher Fishkin, a professor at the University of Texas at Austin, unveiled the research that went into her forthcoming book, Was Huck Black? Mark Twain and African-American Voices.

Twain said Huckleberry Finn, the young narrator of his most famous book, was based on Tom Blankenship, a poor white boy in Hannibal, Mo. But Fishkin argues that Huck’s voice was in part inspired by Jimmy, a 10-year-old black servant. Twain described this boy in an 1874 article in the New York Times as “the most artless, sociable and exhaustless talker I ever came across.” Added Twain: “He did not tell me a single remarkable thing, or one that was worth remembering. And yet he was himself so interested in his small marvels, and they flowed so naturally and comfortably from his lips that . . . I listened as one who receives a revelation.” Beyond fueling a lively debate among Twain scholars, Fishkin’s thesis may help vindicate teachers who have been criticized for using the book on the ground that its portrayal of Huck’s constant companion Jim, whom Huck calls a “nigger,” is racist.

/ Other Twain scholars made some intriguing discoveries about the writer’s personal affairs. Victor Fischer and Michael Frank of the Mark Twain Project at the University of California, Berkeley, said some soon-to-be published letters show that in 1869, Twain, at 33, had launched a campaign to convince Olivia Langdon, 23, that his wanderlust would cease if she married him. Wrote Twain: “It is my strong conviction that, married to you, I would never desire to roam again while I lived.” Despite her reservations, Langdon finally relented. Twain triumphantly wrote to his family, “She said she never could or would love me — but she set herself the task of making a Christian of me. I said she would succeed, but that in the meantime she would unwittingly dig a matrimonial pit & end by tumbling into it — & lo! the prophecy is fulfilled.” Langdon was wed to Twain for the remaining 34 years of her life.