Welcome

When I learned that we were going to be reading classic novels, I thought it was going to be really boring and I admit, I was a little intimidated. I had always assumed that classic novels would be about uninteresting things that would be confusing to read. And when I thought about writing this introduction I had no idea what to say because I seriously didn't understand the purpose of reading books that got the label 'classic'. So when I went to chose my book, I chose titles that I had heard of before. I eventually decided on The Adventures of Tom Sawyer after recognising the title from and episode of "The Fairly Odd Parents". I do also enjoy some aspects of history and thought that this would be a good fit for me. As I got into the book, I really started to enjoy it.

So basically this book is about a boy named Tom who goes on these amazing adventures and gets himself into a lot of trouble. He lives in the southern United States with his brother, sister and aunt. This book is also set in the time before the Civil War when there was slavery. I have also chose to read the sequel to this book called The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn which as about one of Tom's closest friends who is even more adventurous than him.

The author of this book Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens), grew up around the same place and time that this book is set in. The adventures that Tom goes on are based on some of Twain's childhood experiences as well as what he heard people do. When this book was first published, only 24,000 copies were sold in the first year. But it went on to become an American classic and Twain's most famous book.

As I have completed The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and am half way through The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, I have realised the importance of reading classic novels. The purpose of this project is to broaden our minds to new types of literature and to encourage us to read different types of books. We often only read 'teen' novels that do not help us to increase our understanding of english. There is also history in a lot of the classic novels which will help us with our History of English unit. Lastly, it is important to read classic novels because as our understanding of the world increases, so should our difficulty of books.


Over the course of this project I hope to learn about the lives of people from years before me. Even though our lifestyles have changed, I know there will be something to learn about friendship and equality in both of the book I have chosen to read. I hope to use that knowledge to better understand why these books are important to english literature and to society.