Ernest Hemingway said, “All of American literature began with Huck Finn.” And what he’s talking about is someone with the courage—the moral, the artistic, the social courage—to grasp this great underlying problem of American life: race.—Ken Burns

I think he would make an interesting film even if he weren't one of our greatest writers. He saw everything that the 19th century in America had to offer. Riverboat pilot, the hey day of riverboats, crossed the West on a stagecoach, was there at the big booms of the mining in Nevada.—Dayton Duncan