‘Huckleberry Finn’ — Told by His Black Companion Puts the N-Word in Perspective
When ‘James’ tells his version of their Mississippi adventure, the story takes on new meaning. Will the real Nigger Jim please stand up?
1. Burning Mr. Washington
Recently, while reading Percival Everett’s retelling of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn from his enslaved companion’s point of view, I was reminded of something that happened to my brother about a year after my mother died.
Having suffered a heart attack, he was rushed to the hospital in the middle of the night for emergency surgery. As the gurney hustled him down a long hall into the operating room, he looked at the attending physician and said: “Is y’all gon burn Mr. Washington?”
The comment caught the doctor was caught off guard. Despite the gravity of the situation, he cracked up laughing.
At the time of this medical crisis
my brother held advanced degrees in divinity and psychology and also owned a thriving health practice in downtown Chicago. An erudite and well-spoken man, he does not usually speak like a character in a Tyler Perry movie.
