[Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn] is taught more than any other American classic, is often discussed either as a carefree adventure story for children or a serious novel about race relations, yet Levy argues convincingly it is neither. Instead, Huck Finn was written at a time when Americans were nervous about youth violence and “uncivilized” bad boys, and a debate was raging about education, popular culture, and responsible parenting — casting Huck’s now-celebrated “freedom” in a very different and very modern light. – From Simon and Schuster
conversations@efroymson kicks off the spring semester series with a book party celebrating the release of Andy Levy’s third book, Huck Finn’s America: Mark Twain and the Era that Shaped His Masterpiece. A favorite creative nonfiction professor in Butler’s MFA program, Levy practices what he teaches in his newest book.
Nonfiction student Susan Lerner says, “Levy uses research to show us a new way of understanding Huck Finn. In his workshop, Andy Levy taught me that creative nonfiction is supposed to do just that: expose the writer’s thinking so as to give the reader new lenses through which to look at a subject. I can’t wait to read Huck Finn’s America.”
As a professor Levy challenges his students to consider what is creative nonfiction. He explains how his Huck Finn’s America, which has been called part literary theory, part history, part biography, and all persuasive, is creative nonfiction. “This book is a hybrid of creative and critical modes– there are long narrative passages, components one would link to “biography,” a couple of small pieces of memoir, and a scholarly argument with documentation particularly ascendant at the beginning and end of the book,” Levy says. “I picked and chose among the genres available to me. The book is a kind of hybrid– that’s essentially a creative act in itself.”
Already beloved and highly recommended by his students, Levy believes writing this book has only made him a better professor. He says, “It increases the range of my experiences as a writer, my knowledge of process from beginning to end. It’s more hours working, considering writing problems, how to get out of them; more considerations of issues of structure, style, audience. This is also a book about a writer writing a book– a distinctive writer and a distinctive book. I learned a lot about his process, too, and that was wonderful.”
Huck Finn’s America is gaining buzz and earning rave reviews everywhere including Publisher’s Weekly where it made the top 10 list.
NPR calls Levy’s text “a richly researched, copiously annotated, fascinating argument that in all the debates over the book’s treatment of race and despite its position as both a widely banned book and a widely assigned book, we tend to miss some of the most important things it teaches.”
Buffalo News writes, “Levy argues persuasively [and] has steered the conversation of Huck Finn in a fresh, profitable direction, toward an intensive scrutiny of its roots. … Levy’s work reminds us that a fresh reading of Huck Finn might be a key to teaching us that we should not repeat the past, that we are capable of stifling our saddest echoes.”
Dozens more positive reviews exist, but Levy keeps a bigger perspective amid the praise. “Some of [the praise] is validation, excitement. Some of it is embarassment– if the review is really nice, I usually won’t finish reading it, and I often take a certain perverse pleasure in a bad review,” he says. “And some of it is detachment– it’s all external validation, or criticism, or indifference, and we all know from personal experience that we’re not happier if we live for that.”
The book party is January 22nd at 7:30PM in the ECCW sunroom. It will include a brief reading, book signing, and lots of celebrating. Huck Finn’s America: Mark Twain and the Era that Shaped His Masterpiece will be available for purchase.