Tom Sawyer's Character Development in Huck Finn
Tom Sawyer's Character Development in Huck Finn
Mankind goes through inner changes. Boys change to men as girls change to women. You cannot really notice the changes until you actually look back on yourself. Every few years, you can think about how you acted through the past years and how you’ve changed. In The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Mark Twain shows us the change of mankind through a boy’s eyes. He shows us how a boy slowly turns from boy to man and how he is maturing over a short period of time.
In the beginning of the book, Tom Sawyer starts out like an immature boy. At the same time, he is very smart, although, he is not educationally smart. An example of when he was smart is when Aunt Polly made him whitewash the fence. Instead, he tricked some boys in the neighborhood to not only whitewash the fence, but traded goods to whitewash it. (Pgs. 20 - 22) He always gets into trouble. One incident when he got in trouble is in the very beginning of the book. He skipped school and played hooky and then was caught by his Aunt Polly. (Pgs. 12 - 13) Next, his evolution begins.
One day, he met Becky Thatcher. At first sight, he knew he was in love. One time in school, he got in trouble by the schoolmaster and was forced to sit with the girls. He chose to sit next to Becky and he gave her a peach. Becky threw it away but Tom kept putting it back. Then he wrote, “I love you” on a slate and showed it to Becky in a unique way. He made Becky become curious to see what it was, then he slowly moved is hand. (Pgs. 51 - 52) That is one sign of maturity. Another time when he acted “grown-up” is when the schoolmaster wanted to know who tore out a page of his book. Becky was the one who did it and Tom is a witness. She knew he was going to tell. Becky was about to be caught but then Tom said that he is the one who tore out the page of the schoolmaster’s book, even though he didn’t do it. After the trouble was done, Becky said, “Tom, how could you be so noble!” (Pgs. 132 - 134) Becky Thatcher is a factor in the process of...