"All modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain called Huckleberry Finn ," Ernest Hemingway wrote, "It's the best book we've had."nbsp;nbsp;A complex masterpiece that has spawned volumes of scholarly exegesis and interpretative theories, it is at heart a compelling adventure story.nbsp;nbsp;Huck, in flight from his murderous father, and Nigger Jim, in flight from slavery, pilot their raft thrillingly through treacherous waters, surviving a crash with a steamboat, betrayal by rogues, and the final threat from the bourgeoisie.nbsp;nbsp;Informing all this is the presence of the River, described in palpable detail by Mark Twain, the former steamboat pilot, who transforms it into a richly metaphoric entity.nbsp;nbsp;Twain's other great innovation was the language of the book itself, which is expressive in a completely original way.nbsp;nbsp;"The invention of this language, with all its implications, gave a new dimension to our literature," Robert Penn Warren noted.nbsp;nbsp;"It is a language capable of poetry."