Satire is a type of expression that ridicules the short-comings of people or institutions in an attempt to bring about change. The novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is full of satires. It was written during the realism period after the Civil War and in this novel Mark Twain satirizes romanticism, religious hypocrisy, and racism.
The first satire is religious hypocrisy. Twain used the Grangerford-Shepherdson feud to portray this issue. Mark Twain wrote, "The men took their gun [to church] and kept them between their knees or stood them handily against the wall."(Twain 109). These men go to church to pray to God and when they're done, they go out and kill people. They claimed to be a religious person, but they don't follow the teachings. I think Twain was saying that people during this time were hypocrites, they go to church to make themselves look good in front of other people, they don't really take it seriously. Another good example of this is when Twain wrote, "By and by they fetched the niggers in and had prayer, and then everybody was off to bed"(Twain 3). This is very ironic because they pray to God and yet they own a slave. We all know that everyone is equal in God's eyes. This shows that people didn't really take religious seriously, they did it only to make themselves look good.
Twain was also making fun of romanticism because Twain is a realist writer and didn't really like romanticism, so he made fun of romanticism by purposely naming the wrecked ship Walter Scott. When Huck was talking to the watchman, he replied, "on the wreck.what, you don't mean the Walter Scott?"(Twain 73). Walter Scott is a romantic writer and Twain made fun of him by naming the wrecked ship Walter Scott. Also they way Huck, a realist character, always disagree with Tom, a romantic character, symbolized satire on romanticism. When Tom was telling Huck all his ideas about how they're gonna rescue Jim, Huck thought Tom's ideas are foolish, but then Tom said, "It don't make no difference how foolish it is, it's the right way, and it's the regular way.
