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Allusion
Explanation and Analysis—Pilgrim's Progress:
After being separated from Jim and winding up in the care of the aristocratic Grangerford family, Huck looks around their house and notices a pile of books. This moment contains an allusion to Pilgrim's Progress:
There was some books, too, piled up perfectly exact, on each corner of the table. One was a big family Bible, full of pictures. One was Pilgrim’s Progress, about a man that left his family it didn’t say why.
Pilgrim’s Progress is an allusion to an allegorical novel by English writer and preacher John Bunyan. Considered to be one of the most significant books of theological fiction, Pilgrim’s Progress tells the story of a Christian man’s journey to heaven. This book in the Grangerfords’ home is meant to signal the family’s hypocrisy: though they are educated and live in a fancy home full of spiritual and moral texts, their ongoing, murderous feud with the Shepherdsons is utterly barbaric. This is just one example of Twain’s commitment to raising questions about how moral ardent Christians really are.
It is worth noting that Twain even wrote a satirical travel book called The Innocents Abroad OR, The New Pilgrim’s Progress published 15 years before The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.
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