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Mark Twain and James W. C. Pennington: Huckleberry Finn's Smallpox Lie
- Studies in American Fiction
- Johns Hopkins University Press
- Volume 9, Number 1, Spring 1981
- pp. 103-112
- 10.1353/saf.1981.0026
- Article
- Additional Information
MARK TWAIN AND JAMES W. C. PENNINGTON: HUCKLEBERRY FINN'S SMALLPOX LIE William L. Andrews University of Wisconsin One of the more memorable episodes in Adventures of Huckleberry Finn occurs in Chapter 16, when Huck outwits a pair of slavecatchers intent on searching his raft for the runaway Jim. Huck's talent for extemporaneous and effective lying is never demonstrated better than it is in this pressure-filled moment. There is inspiration in Huck's maneuvering the bounty-hunters into the conclusion that all aboard the raft are infected with smallpox. At the same time that the boy's ingenuity and disingenousness are displayed for the reader's enjoyment , the adults' gullibility, abetted by their mean and callous selfregard , is revealed too, adding a satiric dimension to the encounter and reminding the reader of the seriousness of the shore world's corruption. Furthermore, as the aftermath of the scene proves, the lie itself is germane to one of the central themes in the novel, that of the conflict between the hero's "sound heart" and his "deformed conscience." The telling of the lie represents an act of rebellion by Huck's heart in defiance of his society-trained conscience. However, reflecting on the lie later, Huck cannot appreciate with the reader of his story the delicious justice of his lie or its moral defensibility as a means of protecting a fellow fugitive from injustice. Instead, in self-recrimination Huck searches the lie for evidence of his own moral weakness and failure. Out of the pathetic irony of his admission that he cannot "learn to do right"1 comes his more profound inquiry into the nature of moral responsibility and moral choice. "[A] body that don't get started right when he's little ain't got no show," Huck protests, blaming circumstances and training more than anything else for his lying to the slave-catchers. Finally, in a quandary over how to choose between the ambiguous right and wrong of his heart and his conscience, Huck opts for an ethic of expedience, which allows him to by-pass temporarily the knotty problems the smallpox lie occasions. When he confronts these problems once again in Chapter 32, after trying to "pray a lie" to God, Huck realizes the eternal jeopardy in which his lies on Jim's behalf have placed him. But a key sign of his moral growth is revealed in the climax of Chapter 32 when Huck ignores the wages of his own duplicities and determines to save Jim regardless. 104Notes The smallpox lie, therefore, serves as a deft narrative and satiric stroke; the far-reaching and complex moral ramifications of the lie help to endow Huck's story with an ultimately tragic significance. Much could be said in praise of Mark Twain's perceptiveness in adapting Huck's talent for invention to such varied and artful literary ends. But perhaps something should be said about another author who found the lies of a runaway a useful pretext for social criticism and moral reflection . In the summer of 1849, The Fugitive Blacksmith; or, Events in the History of James W. C. Pennington, Pastor of a Presbyterian Church, New York, Formerly a Slave in the State of Maryland, United States was first published in London. A year and two subsequent editions later, James Pennington told his publisher how pleased he was with "the rapid sale of the Sixth Thousand of The Fugitive Blacksmith" and how widespread was the reputation of the narrative in his preaching and lecturing circuit.2 One of the reasons for the popularity of Pennington's narrative stemmed undoubtedly from the extensive account the author made of his escape itself. Almost one-half of the story is devoted to a graphic and suspenseful description of Pennington's winter trek from a plantation eighty miles south of Baltimore to Philadelphia. On the third day of his unplanned and unaided flight, the ex-slave recounts his capture and detainment only a few miles from his home by a group of suspicious Maryland farmers. With no free papers and no plausible reason for being abroad, Pennington is considered a runaway and is taken to a tavern for questioning. Before this...