Both Jane Austen and Mark Twain discuss and ridicule religion and the social ladder in their

novels, Pride and Prejudice and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Though they both broached the same topics, their styles of doing so were very different. Neither author used religious main characters in their novels; both Austen and Twain perceived religion as an undesirable and annoying characteristic. Austens Mr. Collins and Twains Widow Douglas are both portrayed negatively, because they both practice Christianity. Mr. Collins is an uptight, socially awkward preacher with mixed-up ideals. Despite the fact that Austen refrains from exaggerating Mr. Collins religion, she creates him as a conceited, pompous, narrow-minded, silly man, and Collins is disliked by the heroes of the book. Widow Douglas seems to be a good-natured lady, but she attempts to force her Christian ideals on the protagonist at every chance. Huck Finn complains about the Widow often; Here she was abothering about Moses, which was no kin to her, and no use to anybody, being gone, you see..." The authors styles of portraying their characters differ greatly. Austens religious characters remain discreet; though frequently showing up and being quite annoying, Collins is not constantly proclaiming his beliefs. In contrast, Widow Douglas is not a prominent character and shows up rarely, but every single mention of her is accompanied by an excessive religious reference. While Christian is merely an unfortunate title of Mr. Collins, it is the dominant lifestyle of Widow Douglas. Another topic that both Austen and Twain address and satirize is the social ladder of the day. Both authors protagonists are in the lower class and find themselves struggling with the social standards. Austens protagonists come in contact with Lady Catherine de Bourg, an upper-class snob who continually makes the protagonists life miserable. When Elizabeth visits Lady Catherine, she is told not to worry about her simple apparel, since she likes to ha ve the

distinction of rank preserved. However, though the Bennet family does struggle with being lower class, the subject is not satirized constantly since they are not at the bottom of the ladder. Twain, on the other hand, takes a different approach. The social ladder in his world is a bit different; limited mostly to slaves and non-slaves. Twain disagrees with slavery, and so portrays Jim the slave as more of a human than any other authors of the day had. Huck Finn is kept up many nights by his conscience, trying to decide whether or not to turn Jim over to the authorities. By having Jim the slave as a likeable main character, the reader loses the feeling that Jim is a slave, and instead sees him simply as Hucks friend. By portraying Jim in this m anner, Twain went against current mainstream media and attacked the issue of slavery.