The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876) (edit title/settings)

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Characters edit see section history

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• Tom Sawyer: The novel’s protagonist. Tom is a mischievous boy with an active imagination who spends most of the novel getting himself, and often his friends, into and out of trouble. Despite his mischief, Tom has a good heart and a strong moral conscience. As the novel progresses, he begins to take more seriously the responsibilities of his role as a leader among his schoolfellows.
• Becky Thatcher: Judge Thatcher’s pretty, yellow-haired daughter. From almost the minute she moves to town, Becky is the “Adored Unknown” who stirs Tom’s lively romantic sensibility. Naïve at first, Becky soon matches Tom as a romantic strategist, and the two go to great lengths to make each other jealous.
• Amy Lawrence: Tom’s former love. Tom abandons Amy when Becky Thatcher comes to town.
• Sid: Tom’s half-brother. Sid is a goody-goody who enjoys getting Tom into trouble. He is mean-spirited but presents a superficial show of model behavior. He is thus the opposite of Tom, who is warmhearted but very naughty.
• Aunt Polly: Tom’s aunt and guardian. Aunt Polly is a simple, kindhearted woman who struggles to balance her love for her nephew with her duty to discipline him. She generally fails in her attempts to keep Tom under control because although she worries about Tom’s safety, she seems to fear constraining him too much. Above all, Aunt Polly wants to be appreciated and loved.
• Mary: Tom’s sweet, almost saintly cousin. Mary holds a soft spot for Tom. Like Sid, she is well behaved, but unlike him, she acts out of genuine affection rather than malice.
• Jeff Thatcher: Becky's older brother
• Ben Rogers: A friend of Tom Sawyer. Loves to pretend he is a steam boat and the whole crew of the steam boat.
• Robin Hood: A character out of a book Tom Sawyer loves.
• Widow Douglas: She is a devout woman who is determined to see good in Huck Finn and help him if she could.
• Judge Thatcher: Becky's father
• Jim: An African American slave owned by Aunt Polly.
• Mr. Jones: Tom Sawyer is a must read.
• Welchman: The man Huck Finn goes to when he learns the Widow Douglas is in trouble.
• Muff Potter: A hapless drunk and a friend of Injun Joe.
• Injun Joe: Half Native American and half Caucasian; a violent and villainous man who suffers social exclusion, probably because of his race. Frames Muff Potter to get out of murder charges.
• Huckleberry Finn: The son of the town drunk. Huck is a juvenile outcast who is shunned by respectable society and adored by the local boys, who envy his freedom. Like Tom, Huck is highly superstitious, and both boys are always ready for an adventure. Huck gradually replaces Tom’s friend Joe Harper as Tom’s sidekick in his escapades.
• Mrs. Harper: Joe Harper's mother
• Joe Harper: Tom’s “bosom friend” and frequent playmate. Joe is a typical best friend, a convention Twain parodies when he refers to Joe and Tom as “two souls with but a single thought.” Though Joe mostly mirrors Tom, he diverges from Tom’s example when he is the first of the boys to succumb to homesickness on Jackson’s Island. As the novel progresses, Huck begins to assume Joe’s place as Tom’s companion.

Quotes edit see section history

• “He had discovered a great law of human action, without knowing it — namely, that in order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to obtain.”

• “Work consists of whatever a body is obliged to do, and. Play consists of whatever a body is not obliged to do.”

  Tom Sawyer

• “Yes, they had forced him to it at last: he would lead a life of crime. There was no choice.”

  Tom Sawyer

• “It was the cool gray dawn, and there was a delicious sense of repose and peace in the deep pervading calm and silence of the woods. Not a leaf stirred; not a sound obtruded upon Nature's meditation. Beaded dewdrops stood upon the leaves and grasses. A white layer of ashes covered the fire, and a thin blue breath of smoke rose straight into the air.”

• “One day, Tom was in the act of dosing the crack when his aunt's yellow cat came along, purring, eyeing the teaspoon avariciously, and begging for a taste. Tom said, "Don't ask for it unless you want it, Peter." But Peter signified that he did want it. "You better make sure." Peter was sure. "Now you've asked for it, and I'll give it to you, because there ain't anything mean about me, but if you find you don't like it, you mustn't blame anybody but your own self." Peter was agreeable, so Tom pried his mouth open and poured down the pain-killer. Peter sprang a couple of yards in the air, and then delivered a war-whoop and set off round and round the room, banging against furniture, upsetting flower pots, and making general havoc. Next he rose on his find feet and pranced around, in a frenzy of enjoyment, with his head over his shoulder, and his voice declaring his unappeasable happiness. Then he went tearing around the house again spreading chaos and destruction in his path.”

  Narrator

• “Men's misfortunes are forgotten in the excitement of new enterprises”

  - Narrator

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• THE COMPLETE NOVEL: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876)

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• Work consists of whatever a body is OBLIGED to do, and that Play consists of whatever a body is not obliged to do.

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• Tom said to himself that it was not such a hollow world, after all. He had discovered a great law of human action, without knowing it—namely, that in order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to attain.

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• Often, the less there is to justify a traditional custom, the harder it is to get rid of it.

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• Let us draw the curtain of charity over the rest of the scene.

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• THERE comes a time in every rightly-constructed boy's life when he has a raging desire to go somewhere and dig for hidden treasure.

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• their compositions with a sermon; and you will find that the sermon of the most frivolous and the least religious girl in the school is always the longest and the most relentlessly pious. But enough of this. Homely truth is unpalatable.

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• Tom appeared on the sidewalk with a bucket of whitewash and a long-handled brush.

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• He was not the Model Boy of the village. He knew the model boy very well though—and loathed him.

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Setting & Locations edit see section history

• St. Petersburg: A fictional town, inspired by Hannibal, Missouri

First Sentence edit see section history

Table of Contents edit see section history

Series & Lists edit see section history

Followed by Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

Authors & Contributors edit see section history

1. Mark Twain (Author)

First Edition edit see section history

Classification edit see section history

• Library of Congress: PZ7.T88 Ad 2001
• Dewey: 741.5973

Notes for Parents edit see section history

This book can be very hard for young kids to understand, if you want your kids to enjoy the book more wait untill high school.

Subjects edit see section history

• Books › Teens › Literature & Fiction › Classics
• Books › Teens › Literature & Fiction › Adventure & Thrillers
• Books › Literature & Fiction › Genre Fiction › Action & Adventure
• Books › Children's Books › Literature › Action & Adventure
• Books › Children's Books › Literature › Classics by Age
• Books › Children's Books › Ages 9-12

Links to Supplemental Material edit see section history

• Project Gutenberg: Free e-book, full text
• Librivox: Free audio book, Read by John Greenman

Movie Connections edit see section history

• Tom & Huck (IMDb): 1995

More Books Like This edit see section history

Books That Cite This Book edit see section history