Huck, Jim and Tom are American immortals. They resonate in the popular culture and, at the same time, provoke the continual concern and interest of intellectuals in the academic community. When the book was first published, and for years thereafter, many critics complained about the baleful influence the delinquent Huck, with his use of bad language, and skepticism about religion, would have on good God fearing American White boys. They did not sufficiently focus on the issue of race raised by the book. . In recent decades many scholars and educators have severely criticized the book as a bigoted tract that portrays a subservient Jim and repetitively uses the N word. This book answers those more recent concerns. It demonstrates the toughness and humanity of Jim. Professor Wolfson points out how Jim educates Huck and treats him with love. He sets forth the ways in which Jims fundamental humanity awakens Huck to the degradation of his surroundings and leads him to the famous Chapter where Huck resolves to go to hell rather than betray Jim.

This new edition of Huckleberry Finn, based on the recently discovered original handwritten manuscript, is destined to become the standard of this American classic. The volume inclues a discussion by Professor Victor Doyno, President of the Twain Circle and the author of a definitive book about the composition of this great novel, who will also conduct interviews across the country. Illustrations. (Literature)

Praise for the previous edition:RASD/ALA "Outstanding Reference Source, 1996""'Essential' is the word for it!

Wright -- "A closed fist" from Spirals (for violin, viola, and cello) / Judith Lang Zaimont.

Twenty-five essays written by a group of scholars which reassesses the status of Twain's Huckleberry Finn in American literature and in contemporary American culture, reevaluating past scholarship and exploring new directions. A biography of the book's first hundred years (in 1985).

'It's just another song to me. I've written 1,000 of them and it's really just another one.' Jimmy Webb 'When I heard it I cried. It made me cry because I was homesick. It's just a masterfully written song.' Glen Campbell The sound of 'Wichita Lineman' was the sound of ecstatic solitude, but then its hero was the quintessential loner. What a great metaphor he was: a man who needed a woman more than he actually wanted her. Written in 1968 by Jimmy Webb, 'Wichita Lineman' is the first philosophical country song: a heartbreaking torch ballad still celebrated for its mercurial songwriting genius fifty years later. It was recorded by Glen Campbell in LA with a legendary group of musicians known as 'the Wrecking Crew', and something about the song's enigmatic mood seemed to capture the tensions in America at a moment of crisis. Fusing a dribble of bass, searing strings, tremolo guitar and Campbell's plaintive vocals, Webb's paean to the American West describes a telephone lineman's longing for an absent lover, who he hears 'singing in the wire' - and like all good love songs, it's an SOS from the heart. Mixing close-listening, interviews and travelogue, Dylan Jones explores the legacy of a record that has entertained and haunted millions for over half a century. What is it about this song that continues to seduce listeners, and how did the parallel stories of Campbell and Webb - songwriters and recording artists from different ends of the spectrum - unfold in the decades following? Part biography, part work of musicological archaeology, The Wichita Lineman opens a window on to America in the late-twentieth century through the prism of a song that has been covered by myriad artists in the intervening decades.'Americana in the truest sense: evocative and real.' Bob Stanley

In this highly influential study of art forms as models for a theory of communications, Hugh Dalziel Duncan demonstrates that without understanding of the role of symbols in society, social scientists cannot hope to develop adequate models for social analysis. He reviews critically major contributions to communication theory during the past century: Freud's analysis of dream symbolism, Simmel's concept of sociability, James' insights into religious experience, and Dewey's relating of art to experience.