Culture QotD: Leave It on the Shelf

What book have you read that you would recommend other people skip entirely?

Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.  Oh, how I hate that book!   I suppose I prolly shouldn't tell people to not read it though being it's a classic.

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Phaedrus
What about this book did you not like? I loved this book and just recently re-read it.
Paige
The book was okay until the end. I personally thought that once Tom became a major character, the book went downhill fast. Throughout the entire novel, Huck was the main character; but once Tom came back, the spotlight seemed to shine on him until the end. Also, I thought the whole section where Tom gets Huck to play along with freeing Jim was demeaning. Jim starts out as an ignorant slave, but as the plot develops, the reader begins to see him as a real person who is intelligent in his own ways. Tom ends up making Jim revert back into the role of the ignorant slave. So basically Tom ruined the book for me. Also, the first 31ish chapters had a more serious tone to them with some comedic spots, but the ending chapters were almost burlesque.

I know some people love the book, but it just wasn't one that caught my fancy. :)
Phaedrus
Well that was a good answer. I think a lot of times people say they like a book simply because it is a classic and they feel they are supposed to like it. Kudos to you for having your own mind, and the intelligence to be able to articulate the reasons why you didn't like it. I do think though that you should take into account the times that the book was written, as far as your indictment on how Jim was sometimes portrayed. For the times, he was portrayed in an extremely favorable light and the book as a whole was and is seen as an indictment against slavery, but the book was still written in the late 1800's when prevailing attitudes about African Americans were not what they are today. Back in those days, even if a person thought that slavery was wrong, they still thought African Americans to be inferior to whites. Even Abraham Lincoln felt this way. I think the book has to be read understanding that.
Phaedrus
If it's Tom that makes Jim revert back to the stereotypical role of the ignorant slave, then you have to understand that Tom was intentionally written that way, to show him as a character who had the prevailing attitude about blacks in those days. Huck had a more progressive view, who sees Jim as a man who is "intelligent in his own ways" but that view was not the prevailing attitude. Tom was the "everyman" of his day, not Huck.
Paige
That's a good point! Thanks for pointing that out. That information was prolly in my brain already, but I just didn't keep it in mind when reading the book I guess. Although since Tom and Huck had different attitudes, the change in attitude towards Jim just ends up being another huge indicator that Tom took over the roll of main character. I think that's what really bothers me about the novel. I'm still glad that I read it though being it's a classic. It's just not one that I'll prolly want to reread. :)

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