The Originals: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer

Tom Sawyer, a mischievous young boy, lives in the fictional town of St. Petersburg, Missouri with his Aunt Polly and half-brother Sid. Together with his friend Huckleberry Finn, the son of a drunk, ruthless father, he accidentally witnesses a murder. What unfolds in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876) is a series of exhilarating events: both friends identify Injun Joe, the real murderer, in court; testify to the innocence of the person wrongly accused and find buried treasure in a haunted house. After autobiographical works like The Innocents Abroad (1869), and Roughing It (1872), this book was Mark Twain’s debut novel that reflected the author’s own experiences of youth and adulthood. He even chose to name his protagonist after a fireman whom he had met in San Francisco in 1863. Twain presents a sharp social commentary on 19th-century American life through Tom’s tale of childhood resentment against societal hypocrisies.