Literature

Tom Sawyer

Paul Nathan Negrean

Oct 10, 2024 — 17 min read

By Mark Twain

Mark Twain (1835–1910) wrote Tom Sawyer in 1876. It captures the childhood of a kid, Tom Sawyer, who lived on the Mississippi River in the 1840s. Kids are entertained by the whacky story about a child protagonist who went on many adventures with his friends, and adults are reminded of a time when they too were kids.

The Theme of Resilience and Resourcefulness of Children

One of the major themes of this book is the resilience and resourcefulness of kids who, even though the odds may seem against them, can cope with sadness, fear, anger, boredom, and bounce back to being happy. Tom Sawyer and his friends represent all children in this story. Some examples of kids' resilience and resourcefulness in this story are:

Tom turns a boring day of whitewashing a fence into a fun time by tricking his friends into thinking this chore was desirable and fun.
Tom is punished on a Saturday because he lied to his aunt. He has to whitewash the fence, but he has a brilliant idea. He sells this “privilege” to some of his friends and gets “rich” out of it.

Tom and Joe turn a boring day in school into a fun time by playing with a tick in class.
While at school, Tom decides to search his pockets and finds the tick he bought from Huckleberry Finn. They both start playing with the poor bug and get whooped by the teacher who noticed their absence of mind.

Tom saves Becky from her punishment by taking it for her, thus making himself a hero in her eyes and redeeming their relationship.
He was beaten in front of the class instead of Becky, taking her blame for ripping a page out of the teacher's book. He is rewarded for his actions by making up with Becky, who called him noble. Likewise, he is no longer depressed and having morbid wishes when he is disciplined.

"For a little while, hope made a show of reviving — not with any reason to back it, but only because it is its nature to revive when the spring has not been taken out of it by age and familiarity with failure."

This quote from the 33d chapter of Tom Sawyer encapsulates the theme of resilience and resourcefulness of young people. When someone is young, they are more hopeful than the older generations, who experienced more disappointment and failure than their younger counterparts.

Exposition

The story is set in the small town of St. Petersburg, Missouri, on the Mississippi. We are introduced to three of the characters, Tom, Aunt Polly, and Sidney. Aunt Polly is Tom's aunt who is taking care of him after his mother has died, alongside Sidney, her son.

Initiating Event

Tom is a mischievous boy who does many dumb things (like fighting a stranger for no reason) while Sid, is a quiet kid and is more prudent, but also is a snitch on Tom. Aunt Polly wants to do a good job in taking care of Tom and raising to be a good man, but she is sometimes tricked by Tom to escape her discipline; Polly sometimes feels like she is not a good enough job, correcting him.

Rising Action

Tom is punished on a Saturday because he lied to his aunt. He has to whitewash the fence, but he has a brilliant idea. He sells the “privilege” to whitewash the fence to some of his friends and gets “rich” out of it. After scamming his friends into doing his chores, he runs off after throwing dirt clods at Sid.

Tom spots a new girl in town and starts trying to impress her by showing his physical strength when she is looking in his direction. He then goes off into the forest after dinner when Sid breaks a sugar bowl and starts contemplating death because he feels mistreated and melodramatic after an encounter with his aunt, who told him she suspected him of doing bad things when she was not looking. He imagines his aunt begging him not to die as he lies dying in front of her.

The next morning is a Sunday. Tom listens to his aunt reading the Bible and starts working on learning his verse for the day. He then goes to Sunday school, where he buys tickets that kids would get from learning verses to exchange for a new Bible. This indicates that Tom is intelligent and knows a good deal when he sees one; the Bible that he would be given would be worth 40 cents, which is more than what he spent on the tickets, thus making a profit.

“Then Tom traded a couple of white alleys for three red tickets,”

He has enough to claim one and is very excited because there was a judge on stage to greet whoever would have enough tickets to get a Bible. Tom and the rest of the boys in the Sunday school viewed judges with awe, and to greet and shake one's hand was considered an honor. He goes up on the stand and meets the Judge, but when he is asked who the first two disciples were, he answers, “DAVID AND GOLIATH!”

The irony in this part of the story is that the reader knows that Tom did not get the tickets because of his knowledge of the Bible, but by buying them, so when he has to tell the judge who the first two apostles were, both the judge and the teacher would think that he would know the answer, while in fact he does not.

In his adventures, the challenge for Tom is to turn the boring, tedious, sad tasks into a fun time for him and others.

In Chapter 5, Tom succeeds in changing a boring church service into an entertaining time. At first, he sees a fly and tries to capture it but is caught by his aunt who forces him to put it back. This part has some humor in it because the fly is described it in the act of torturing “his spirit by calmly rubbing its hands together.”

He then takes out a beetle and plays with it, which results in his finger being pinched. It drops to the floor some distance away from him, and a poodle that was not leashed runs up and starts playing with it. It gets pinched and runs back to its master, who throws it out of the window to the constrained laughter of all the churchgoers.

On Monday, Tom goes to school, which he sees as an unenjoyable activity “captivity and fetters” (a metaphor for school). He tries to stay home and not go to school by faking sickness.

Eventually, the day turns out to be a fun day.

First, his friends are fascinated by how he spits with his new tooth gap.

Secondly, he has a fun time by talking to a boy named Huckleberry Finn, who he was not allowed to talk to. He agrees with Huck, that later that night they would go to the graveyard with a dead cat to cast a spell upon warts.

Thirdly, when he arrives at school, he is questioned by the teacher about why he is late, and because he has the chance to impress the girl named Becky Thatcher, he does not lie and after a beating, is forced to spend the day with the girls. He takes the opportunity to woo Becky by drawing images of different things for her and promising to teach her later that day how to draw.

Tom was in school and was extremely bored. He tries to cope with it by focusing on his school, but is unable to because of the prospects of meeting Becky after his studies.

He then decides to search his pockets and finds the tick he bought off Huckleberry Finn. Furthermore, he uses this tick to turn a boring day of school into a fun time for him and his friend. They both start playing with the poor bug and get whooped by the teacher who noticed their absence of mind.

Later that day, Tom successful turns a school afternoon into a fun time by spending it with Becky.

Two themes used in this part of the story are the theme of love (the “romance” between Tom and Becky) and the theme of discipline (the teacher beating Tom and his friend for playing with the tick during school).

After school, Tom is very depressed because of the fight he had with Becky. At first, he thinks that dying would make Becky regret her rejection, but then he remembered that “his Sunday school record” would not allow for him to die (my assumption is that he was afraid of going to hell).

He thinks about disappearing and becoming a soldier, an Indian chief, and finally decides upon being a pirate and then returning and having Becky and all others awed by him and fearing him. This prospect pleased him very much, and he decided to start the very next day!

and hear with swelling ecstasy the whisperings, “It’s Tom Sawyer the Pirate! — the Black Avenger of the Spanish Main!”

He goes to a place in the forest to see if some “magic” incantations he had said had worked, but they had not, and he attributed it to a witch interfering (the theme of young boy's superstitions).

Tom then acts out the part of Robin Hood with his friend, and they have a fun time doing this.

His glorious plans, the incantations, and pretending to be Robin Hood diverted his attention from Becky, thus making him happy.

This constant pretending and yearning for adventure shows us that Tom does not like the idea of being cooped up and forced to follow instructions, but rather to be free as the wind. Joe Harper had the same idea, and they agreed:

they would rather be outlaws a year in Sherwood Forest than President of the United States forever.

Tom is lying in his bed, restless. He is excited about the prospect of meeting Huck later that night and getting rid of warts with a dead cat in a graveyard. He tries to get out of the suspense by sleeping, and it actually works for a while, but then he is awoken by Huck calling for him.

When they arrive at the graveyard, they are anxious about being seen by devils, and they see a light in the darkness. Huck thinks that it was devils and Tom starts to pray, but they notice that they were just men.

What is Ironic is that before going to the graveyard, they expected that they would meet demons and thought they were not scary, but when they were actually there the “demons” were scary.

They witness three men grave robbing, and one of them is murdered!

They run away as far as they can and soon reach a shed where they look at each other with horror. Talking about the murder, they had just witnessed was how they tried to get over it, but it didn't work.

They turn this dreary, abysmal time into a more fun time by carving a promise to never tell anyone about the murder on a rock slab and drawing their names on it with blood.

A stray dog starts barking, and they superstitiously believe that the barking of a stray dog signalled the death of who it was barking at (the theme of superstition is used here). They then see that it is not barking at them, but at Muff Potter, who was sleeping nearby (this is a foreshadowing of the arrest of Muff).

Tom goes home and Sid tells on him the next day for sneaking out. Tom, even though he disliked some rules his aunt made, loved her. This is shown through the fact that he would rather be beaten than see her crying about him the following morning.

Tom then goes to school and gets beaten by the teacher, and sees a gift that he gave to Becky the previous day. A saying used in this chapter at the end when he sees the returned gift is:

This final feather broke the camel’s back.

This means that all of Tom's sorrows built up and finally this was the one that topped all the rest.

The following day, the murder is discovered by the people of the town, and it is assumed that Muff Potter did it. Tom and Huck go to the graveyard with everyone else and try to get out of their guilty consciousnesses by viewing the crime scene, but it doesn't work.

Indian Joe testifies against Muff, and he is taken to jail. Tom tries to soothe his consciousness by giving Muff some food and other gifts in the jail, and that works slightly.

He then turns this day into a less haunting experience by avoiding all the kids who are talking about the crime and who are making inquiries to get dead cats (to do the same thing Huck and Tom did)

In this chapter, Tom and Huck believe that because Indian Joe lied about the murder, God would strike him with a lightning bolt from heaven. This does not happen, and it is assumed that the Indian had sold his soul to the Devil. This is foreshadowing of how Joe would be punished for murder by God in the cave, where he dies of starvation.

Another foreshadowing that occurs in this chapter is when Tom gives some gifts to Muff, who is in jail, foreshadowing his release because of Tom and Huck.

Tom finds out Becky is sick and is not coming to school. Tom tries to get out of this pain by acting depressed and sad, but that does not calm him and just makes his aunt to give him quack painkiller.

He tries to get out of this mood by playing with some of the medicine that his aunt had given him. Tom feeds it to their cat, Peter, who has a fit and runs around the house screaming.

What is ironic in this part is that Aunt Polly blames Tom for harassing the cat by feeding it painkiller when she did the same thing to Tom.

After Tom sees that Becky is back in school, he tries to impress her, but ends up making a fool of himself in Becky's eyes.

Mf! some people think they’re mighty smart — always showing off!

A theme used in this part of the story is the theme of guilt, Tom and Huck feel guilty about Muff's arrest and about the fact that they did not tell the truth to the town about Joe (sentencing an innocent man to death), Indian Joe being guilty of the murder, Muff Potter feeling guilty of Indian Joe's crime.

Tom leaves town the next day and decided to be a pirate. He is very depressed and is sad about how he was “forced” into this decision by having “no friends” and being “despised by everyone.” His friend, Joe, has the same idea and they both go off. They then get out of their misery by planning to become pirates and imagining their life as criminals of the seas.

The boys then steal different resources to fund their adventures and begin the very next day. Tom has fun by naming all of his friends different pirate names, such as “Huck Finn, The Red Handed”.

Two hoarse whispers delivered the same awful word simultaneously to the brooding night: (personification of the night)

Another fun thing that the boys do is driving a raft down the river and pretending that they are pirates. They do this for a while and arrive at an island in the river where they set up camp.

The next thing they do that is entertaining is cooking a large meal and talk about the superiority of their new lifestyle.

It is ironic how they talk about stealing and plundering loot lightheartedly, but when they try to go to sleep, their consciences are wracked by the fact that they stole, and they said to themselves they would never steal again, even though real pirates stole to live.

So they inwardly resolved that so long as they remained in the business, their piracies should not again be sullied with the crime of stealing.

The next day, the boys had a lot of fun, fishing for breakfast, splashing around in the water, and exploring the island. They hear some ominous booms in the distance, and are slightly scared by this development. They overcome fear by speculating about it and coming to the conclusion that it was a steamboat searching for a drowned body. Their trepidations turn into delight when they realize that the people are looking for them!

A theme commonly used in this story is the theme of childish imagination, Tom believed that telling a ladybug that its house was on fire would make it go home (he believed that ladybugs were afraid of conflagrations).

What is funny in the next part is that Tom mentions to Joe that they would not be returning to civilization, but as soon as the latter fell asleep, he went to shore to check on his aunt.

The dramatic irony in this part of the story is how we (the readers) know that Tom is not dead but was alive in aunt Polly's house, but she is not aware of the facts and neither is Joe's mom.

Tom and the rest of the boys are having a fun time (swimming, fishing, feasting, etc…) but soon become depressed because they were homesick and missing being with other people. They cheer up when Tom tells Joe about his little secret (visiting their hometown at night) and about a plan of his to appear at their funeral.

The boys then turn the melancholy time into a fun time by learning how to smoke from Huckleberry Finn. They think that they are so cool and that the other boys would envy them.

They become sick from smoking and go off to cope with it.

The next day, after a very violent storm, the boys are again depressed. They get out of it by pretending to be Indian war chiefs who fought and killed each other by the thousands.

The day comes and as everyone in the village is attending the funeral and everyone is weeping the death of the three boys, the boys in question appear and everyone rejoices.

The next morning, Aunt Polly tells Tom how sad she was that he didn't care about her enough to tell her about him being alive all the time he wasn't home. Tom rids himself of the guilty feeling by telling aunt Polly that he had a dream about her, giving her an accurate summary of what she did the night when he disappeared. This makes his aunt happy because he cared enough to dream about her.

He then goes to school, a hero of the masses, and is looked up to by all the kids in the entire town. He turns this fame into a fun time by showing off his strutting as a pirate and telling about his adventures.

Becky tries to invite him to a picnic, but Tom, who is acting tough, ignores her invitation and continues walking with his previous girlfriend, Amy. This gets Becky annoyed and mainly sad. This is another way in which Tom entertains himself.

When Tom arrives home, he is confronted by his aunt, who discovered the lie he told her about his dream. Tom does not like it when his aunt is sad or dismayed because of him. He manages to redeem himself in her eyes by telling her about the bark cloth that he had in his pocket, and about how he kissed her.

In the next chapter, Tom shows signs of maturity. He was beaten in front of the class instead of Becky, taking her blame on himself. He is rewarded for his actions by making up with Becky, who called him noble. Likewise, he is no longer depressed and having morbid wishes when he is disciplined.

A theme commonly used in this story is the theme of deceit. Tom deceives the teacher into thinking he had ripped the book and his aunt about the dream. His intentions in deceit were good, but Indian Joe's were not. He deceives all the towns-people into thinking Muff Potter was a murderer.

Tom and his class have a general dislike for their school master, who makes their days very hard and boring because of his harshness and tyranny. They find a way to change the monotony of school into a fun time by planning pranks on the tyrant.

One of the students, whose family boarded the teacher, found a fun way to get back at him. At the end of the “Examination day” school show, the prankster attaches a cat to a rope and lowers it down onto the master's head. This makes his wig fall off, exposing his gilded bald head.

Vacation has arrived and everyone is bored. They entertain themselves by pretending to be a circus, by celebrating the fourth of July, by meeting a U.S. senator (they were thought to be a million miles tall by the boys of the town), etc… This ends up working for some time, but they then get depressed again.

Tom gets sick with the measles and when he comes out of his home he sees that everyone has started to be pious and read out of the scriptures, even Huck Finn! This part is ironic because he sees religion as a bad thing that made his friends repent of stealing and cursing (something he saw as a fun pastime).

He then meets Joe and Huck, who had both gone back to their sinful way, eating a stolen watermelon.

Tom and Huck feel very, very guilty for not speaking out for Muff Potter. They try to relieve themselves of the guilt by giving the prisoner food and tobacco, but this does not ease their consciousnesses.

The suspense builds up through the days leading up to the trial with Tom and Huck having nightmares, feeling bad when Muff is treated poorly, when everybody is talking about it, etc… At the trial, Muff's lawyer does not do anything to try to help the man, but finally Tom steps up.

He relieves his consciousness by telling everyone about what had happened that night in the graveyard, and just as soon as he finished, Indian Joe ran out of there and disappeared.

The irony is that Huck and Tom had sworn twice to never tell anyone about what happened, but when the crucial moment of truth came, they told anyway, disregarding their oaths.

The next day, Tom is bored. He devises a scheme that would entertain him, and he goes off to find a friend with which he would dig for treasure! He finds only Huck and they go off together.

They turn the labor of digging into a fun time by talking about what they would do with their share of the treasure when they found some. Tom would get married, and Huck would spend it all quickly.

They don't find any treasure and decide to wait until midnight to dig. The author builds up suspense in this part of the chapter, using the children's imagination in the description of the night scene:

Spirits whispered in the rustling leaves, ghosts lurked in the murky nooks, the deep baying of a hound floated up out of the distance, an owl answered with his sepulchral note

When they finally start digging again, they decide to stop and leave the work for the next morning because they were afraid of ghosts and skeletons.

A theme used in this part of the story is the theme of childish superstition (Tom and Huck believe that ghosts were real and would attack them if they were in a haunted house at night).

Tom and Huck decide to skip the next day's treasure hunting because it was a Friday (an unlucky day according to their superstitions). They turn this day into a fun time by pretending to be Robin Hood and his gang.

A foreshadowing in the previous part of the story is the mention of ghosts in the haunted house, which foreshadows that Indian Joe and another criminal were hiding out there.

The two boys enter the house and see Indian Joe and another man hiding from the law. At first, they are afraid, but the discovery of thousands of dollars worth of gold changes this into a feeling of joy at the idea that they could steal this fortune.

They leave the house with a resolution to steal the gold from the criminals, but furthermore, they are afraid when they heard Indian Joe say something about his revenge…

The boys are sad because they have lost the fortune. They discuss the gold and the location of its hiding place, and cheer up when they realize where it was. They plan to follow Indian Joe and his comrade to the fabled “Number 2” to take the money!

The next few days, the boys are “haunting” the outside of the place where they think “Number Two” is, being afraid of losing the gold. They guard the entrance to said place, and finally, one day, Tom enters it and gets scared out of his wits because he almost stumbled on Indian Joe!

The next day, Tom shifts into a happy mood because Becky had finally come back. He goes with her on a series of fun activities like eating ice cream and spelunking.

Huck, on the other hand, is terrified because he had just witnessed Indian Joe and his comrade talking about mutilating Widow Douglas. He decides to repay her kindness to him, by telling some of her friends about what was happening and leading them to where they could chase off the hooligans.

Huck is now in the care of Widow Douglas. During the day, he hears from the men who had attacked Indian Joe and his companion that they had not succeeded in killing the hooligans, but just chased them off. They tell Huck that they found a box and the boy loses hope, believing that it was the money, but it turns out it was just some burglary tools.

Meanwhile, in the village, Tom and Becky are missing, and it is believed that they are still in the cave!

Tom and Becky are in the cave and are afraid that they will die in it. Tom gives Becky hope by telling her that the people of the town were probably searching for them. This brightens the children's moods for a little, but eventually, they become sad again. Tom attaches a rope to himself and goes to see if he could find the rescuers, but instead he sees Indian Joe and runs back to Becky.

The children are saved after finding a way out of the cave, and Tom & Becky are safe once more. The judge says that he locked up the cave and that no one would be able to enter it, and Tom tells him that Indian Joe was in it!

Climax

They go to check the cave entrance and see Indian Joe's body outside the door. Tom feels sad for this man because he knew how he felt being trapped in a cave without food, but that soon is replaced by the relief that Joe together with his revenge was no more. He has fun with Huck and shows him where the gold was, and they both revel in their riches.

Falling Action

Huck and Tom show off their money and instantly become respected by everyone in the town. Becky tells her father about all the nice things that Tom had done for her (giving her hope in the cave and taking her whipping) and he is impressed by the boy's noble character. Tom now has a steady income and decides to become a pretend robber with his friends.