 While popular culture traded on "puerile" and sentimental pastoralism—that is, the simple and unreflective urge to find a "middle ground" between the over-civilization of the city and the "violent uncertainties of nature" (28)--serious literature took a hard, careful look at the contradictions in American culture—and particularly the conflict between the old bucolic image of America and its new image as an industrial power (26).It is the "role" of literature, argues Marx, to show us the "contradiction" of our commitments to both rural happiness and "productivity, wealth, and power".One example of this image occurs in "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn".