The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

de bene esse: literally, of well-being, morally acceptable but subject to future validation or exception

On this Day in History in 1885, Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was published in the United States.

 

As a result of the book's crude language and depiction of slavery and life in the South, it was banned in places. Today, literary critics recognize it as a literary masterpiece, but the book remains controversial in schools.

 Keep learning about Twain's work and other literary classics with American Masters | PBS' "The American Novel" timeline at http://to.pbs.org/Xk58uQ

(Image: 1884 Illustration from first edition of Huckleberry Finn (Library of Congress).