Tom Sawyer

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Plot summary

An imaginative and mischievous twelve-year-old boy named Thomas Sawyer lives with his Aunt Polly and his half-brother, Sid, also known as Sidney, in the Mississippi River town of St. Petersberg, Missouri. After playing hooky from school on Friday and dirtying his clothes in a fight, Tom is made to whitewash the fence as punishment on Saturday. At first, Tom is disappointed by having to forfeit his day off. However, he soon cleverly persuades his friends to trade him small treasures for the privilege of doing his work. He trades these treasures for tickets given out in Sunday school for memorizing Bible verses and uses the tickets to claim a Bible as a prize. He loses much of his glory, however, when, in response to a question to show off his knowledge, he incorrectly answers that the first two disciples were David and Goliath.
Tom falls in love with Becky Thatcher, a new girl in town, and persuades her to get “engaged” to him. Their romance collapses when she learns that Tom has been engaged before—to a girl named Amy Lawrence. Shortly after being shunned by Becky, Tom accompanies Huckleberry Finn, the son of the town drunk, to the graveyard at night to try out a “cure” for warts. At the graveyard, they witness the murder of young Dr. Robinson by the Native American “half-breed” Injun Joe. Scared, Tom and Huck run away and swear a blood oath not to tell anyone what they have seen. Injun Joe blames his companion, Muff Potter, a hapless drunk, for the crime. Potter is wrongfully arrested, and Tom's anxiety and guilt begin to grow.
Tom, Huck and their friend Joe Harper run away to an island to become pirates. While frolicking around and enjoying their new found freedom, the boys become aware that the community is sounding the river for their bodies. Tom sneaks back home one night to observe the commotion. After a brief moment of remorse at the suffering of his loved ones, Tom is struck by the idea of appearing at his funeral and surprising everyone. He persuades Joe and Huck to do the same. Their return is met with great rejoicing, and they become the envy and admiration of all their friends.
Back in school, Tom gets himself back in Becky's favor after he nobly accepts the blame for a book that she has torn. Soon Muff Potter's trial begins, and Tom, overcome by guilt, testifies against Injun Joe. Potter is acquitted, but Injun Joe flees the courtroom through a window.
Fall arrives, and Tom and Huck go hunting for buried treasure in a haunted house. After venturing upstairs they hear a noise below. Peering through holes in the floor, they see Injun Joe enter the house disguised as a deaf and mute Spaniard. He and his companion, an unkempt man, plan to bury some stolen treasure of their own. From their hiding spot, Tom and Huck wriggle with delight at the prospect of digging it up. By an amazing coincidence, Injun Joe and his partner find a buried box of gold themselves. When they see Tom and Huck's tools, they become suspicious that someone is sharing their hiding place and carry the gold off instead of reburying it.
Huck begins to shadow Injun Joe every night, watching for an opportunity to nab the gold. Meanwhile, Tom goes on a picnic to McDougal's Cave with Becky and their classmates. That same night, Huck sees Injun Joe and his partner making off with a box. He follows and overhears their plans to attack the Widow Douglas, a kind resident of Hannibal. By running to fetch help, Huck forestalls the violence and becomes an anonymous hero.
Tom and Becky get lost in the cave, and their absence is not discovered until the following morning. The men of the town begin to search for them, but to no avail. Tom and Becky run out of food and candles and begin to weaken. The horror of the situation increases when Tom, looking for a way out of the cave, happens upon Injun Joe, who is using the cave as a hideout. Eventually, just as the searchers are giving up, Tom finds a way out. The town celebrates, and Becky's father, Judge Thatcher seals up the main entrance with a iron door. After a week Injun Joe, trapped inside, starves to death. Joe's partner accidentally drowns trying to escape,
A week later, Tom takes Huck to the cave via the new entrance Tom has found and they find the box of gold, the proceeds of which are invested for them. The Widow Douglas adopts Huck, and, when Huck attempts to escape civilized life, Tom promises him that if he returns to the widow, he can join Tom's robber band. Reluctantly, Huck agrees.

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Literary significance and reception

The sales of Tom Sawyer were lukewarm at first. It initially sold less than a third as many copies as Twain's Innocents Abroad. By the time of Mark Twain's death, however, Tom Sawyer was both an American classic and a bestseller.

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Publication history

The first publication of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer was by Chatto and Windus, in England in June, 1876 (it was listed as "ready" on June 10th and was reviewed on June 24th in the literary publication The Atheneum), and in the U.S. by subscription only in December 1876. Twain and other U.S. authors used initial publication in England fairly often, since otherwise it was impossible to obtain a copyright in the British Commonwealth. In the case of Tom Sawyer, the delay between the London and U.S. editions extended much beyond what Twain envisioned, or desired. This led to widespread piracy of the work - notably a July, 1876 pirated edition in Canada obtained by many American readers - and, Twain believed, to a significant loss of his royalties.
When the work did appear in the U.S., it was sold by subscription only. In this distribution method, book agents across the country took orders for the book prior to publication and then delivered the book when available. It was only with subsequent editions that the book became available at retail shops.

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Film adaptations

The story of Tom Sawyer has been filmed or animated multiple times since its initial publication. Some of the film adaptations of Twain's novel include:

• A 1907 silent version released by the Paramount studio
• A 1917 silent version directed by William Desmond Taylor, starring Jack Pickford as Tom
• A 1930 version directed by John Cromwell, starring Jackie Coogan as Tom
• In 1938 The Adventures of Tom Sawyer was filmed in Technicolor by the Selznick Studio. It starred Tommy Kelly as Tom and was directed by Norman Taurog. Most notable was the cave sequence designed by William Cameron Menzies.
• A 1947 Soviet Union version, directed by Lazar Frenkel and Gleb Zatvornitsky
• A 1960 US television serial, also shown on British television
• A 1968 French/German made-for-television miniseries, directed by Wolfgang Liebeneiner, starring Roland Demongeot as Tom and Marc Di Napoli as Huck
• A 1973 musical version with songs by Richard and Robert Sherman, starring Johnny Whitaker as Tom and a young Jodie Foster as Becky Thatcher. There was also a TV movie version released that same year which starred Buddy Ebsen as Muff Potter, and which was filmed in Upper Canada Village.
• The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (anime) (1980), a Japanese anime TV series by Nippon Animation, part of the World Masterpiece Theater; aired in the United States on HBO
• A 1984 Canadian claymation version produced by Hal Roach studios
• Tom and Huck (1995), starring Jonathan Taylor Thomas as Tom and Brad Renfro as Huck Finn
• A 1995 episode for the PBS Wishbone TV series.
• The Modern Adventures of Tom Sawyer
• A 2000 animated adaptation, featuring the characters as anthropomorphic animals with an all-star voice cast, including country singers Rhett Akins (as Tom), Mark Wills (as Huck Finn), Lee Ann Womack, Waylon Jennings and Hank Williams Jr. as well as Betty White as Aunt Polly
• Tom Sawyer appears as a United States Secret Service agent in the 2003 movie based on comic book series The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen
• This book was featured in an episode of The Fairly Odd Parents

Stage musicals: In 1956 'We're From Missouri', a musical adaptation of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, with book, music and lyrics by Tom Boyd was presented by the students at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. In 1960, Boyd's musical version (re-titled TOM SAWYER was presented professionally at Theatre Royal Stratford East in London, England and in 1961 toured provincial theatres in England.