I've recently finished re-reading, with the greatest delight, Samuel
Butler's The Way of All Flesh.  This time through, the many similarities
between Butler's novel and Huckleberry Finn jumped out at me.   (Butler
even did his last work on the manuscript in  1884, the year Huckleberry
Finn appeared; though 'Flesh' came out posthumously, in 1903.)

Above all,  what strikes me is the similar treatment of the hero's struggle
to wriggle out from under what he has been taught.  Like Huck, the young
Ernest Pontifex believes himself to be a depraved soul who can somehow
never be "good," as those around him are good.  He loathes every priggish
thing that the upright people  Huck would call "the quality" stand for,
without being remotely able to confront his loathing squarely.  He despises
Sunday, he feels endlessly guilty for not being comfortable around "nice"
people . . . and on and on.

This leads me to two questions.
1.  Can anyone recommend  a good article or book chapter comparing The Way
of All Flesh and Huckleberry Finn?  I would greatly prefer something
written in English to something written in academic flatulence, but will be
happy  to hear of anything useful.

2.  My second question is much broader.  It also struck me that both
'Flesh' and 'Huck' may reflect a widespread late-Victorian assault on sham,
cant, and many forms of hypocrisy.   That is, I've started
viewing  Butler's book and Twain's in the light of Ibsen's  most shocking
plays, and of  Tolstoy's assaults on the hollowness of bourgeois life (esp.
in "The Death of Ivan Ilych")....And then I started thinking about Oscar
Wilde and Bernard Shaw....

So..... Can anyone recommend a good general  study of later Victorian
attacks on sham,  mealy-mouthed lies, hypocrisies and the like?

Many thanks,

Mark Coburn