Everett’s James and Twain’s “Jim”: Reimagining and Subverting Mark Twain’s Masterpiece
Percival Everett’s most recent book, James, published in 2024 and winner of the National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, boldly retells the story of Jim, an enslaved person who is peripheral in Mark Twain’s novel, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, but becomes the central narrator of his book. In doing so, Everett explores and reimagines the era of slavery in America, including the period of the Civil War. Through the eyes of the intelligent, well read, and incisive James, readers experience the horrors and degradation of slavery as well as identify with the power and complexity of the human condition.
Drawing on the role of Twain’s novel in American literary history, this presentation will explore recent critical interpretations and controversies about Adventures of Huckleberry Finn that inform Everett’s novel. Through a discussion of selected scenes, the audience is invited to consider how Everett reframes Twain’s original story both to pay homage to him and to challenge our views of America by invoking a beloved American writer.
Elizabeth Petrino is Professor of English and Director of Liberal Studies on the Bellarmine campus at Fairfield University. She earned her B.A. at the State University of New York at Buffalo and received her Ph.D. at Cornell University. She has authored several books, including Emily Dickinson and Her Contemporaries: Women’s Verse in America, 1820-1885 (UPNE, 1998), and edited with Jocelyn Boryczka Jesuit and Feminist Education: Intersections in Teaching and Learning for the Twenty-first Century(Fordham, 2012), which won the national Alpha Sigma Nu Award for 2013 in “Professional Studies.” In addition, she edited with Mary Louise Kete Lydia Sigourney: Critical Essays and Cultural Views(University of Massachusetts Press, 2018). Recently, her articles have appeared in ESQ, ISLE, and Studies in American Humor. Currently, she is working on Emily Dickinson’s reading and use of literary allusion, particularly in relation to Transatlantic women writers.
Please register, so we can set the community room up with appropriate seating.
Please read both titles before attending; we recommend reading Adventures of Huckleberry Finn before reading James.
You may also like the following events from Avon Free Public Library:
- This Thursday, 14th August, 02:00 pm, Understanding Nutrition Labels (In-Person Event) in Avon
- This Thursday, 14th August, 06:30 pm, Local Government 101 (in-person) in Avon
- Next Monday, 18th August, 05:00 pm, Your Children Don’t Want It – Zoom with Appraisal and Downsizing Expert Mike Ivankovich in Avon, Connecticut
Also check out other
Arts events in Avon,
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