Tom Sawyer Essay -- essays research papers

AN IMAGINATIVE AND MISCHIEVOUS BOY named turkey cock Sawyer lives with his Aunt Polly and his half-brother, Sid, in the Mississippi River town of St. Petersburg, Missouri. After playing hooky from school on Friday and dirtying his clothes in a fight, Tom is made to whitewash the repugn as punishment on Saturday. At first, Tom is disappointed by having to forfeit his day off. However, he soon cleverly persuades his friends to trade him small treasures for the fringe benefit of doing his work. He trades these treasures for tickets given out in Sunday school for memorizing Bible verses and uses the tickets to claim a Bible as a prize. He loses much of his glory, however, when, in response to a question to show off his knowledge, he incorrectly answers that the first two disciples were David and Goliath. Tom falls in love with Becky Thatcher, a radical girl in town, and persuades her to get engaged to him. Their romance collapses when she learns that Tom has been engaged beforeto a girl named Amy Lawrence. Shortly after being shunned by Becky, Tom accompanies Huckleberry Finn, the son of the town drunk, to the graveyard at night to try out a cure for warts. At the graveyard, they witness the murder of young Dr. Robinson by the indigenous American half-breed red man Joe. Scared, Tom and Huck run away and swear a blood oath not to tell anyone what they have seen. Injun Joe blames his companion, Muff Potter, a hapless drunk, for the crime. Potter is wrongfully arrested, and Toms anxiety and guilt...