FREE ESSAY ON ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN BY MARK TWAIN

ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN BY MARK TWAIN

In the novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain, there is a lot of
superstition. Some examples of superstition in the novel are Huck killing a spider which
is bad luck, the hair-ball used to tell fortunes, and the rattle-snake skin Huck touches
that brings Huck and Jim good and bad luck. Superstition plays an important role in the
novel Huck Finn.
In Chapter one Huck sees a spider crawling up his shoulder, so he flipped it off and it
went into the flame of the candle. Before he could get it out, it was already shriveled
up. Huck didn't need anyone to tell him that it was an bad sign and would give him bad
luck. Huck got scared and shook his clothes off, and turned in his tracks three times. He
then tied a lock of his hair with a thread to keep the witches away. You do that when
you've lost a horseshoe that you've found, instead of nailing it up over the door, but I
hadn't ever heard anybody say it was any way to keep of bad luck when you'd killed a
spider.(Twain 5).
In chapter four Huck sees Pap's footprints in the snow. So Huck goes to Jim to ask him
why Pap is here. Jim gets a hair-ball that is the size of a fist that he took from an
ox's stomach. Jim asks the hair-ball; Why is Pap here? But the hair-ball won't answer.
Jim says it needs money, so Huck gives Jim a counterfeit quarter. Jim puts the quarter
under the hair-ball. The hair-ball talks to Jim and Jim tells Huck that it says. Yo'ole
father doan' know yit what he's a-gwyne to do. Sometimes he spec he'll go 'way, en den
ag'in he spec he'll stay. De bes' way is tores' easy en let de ole man take his own way.
Dey's two angles hoverin' roun' 'bout him. One uv'em is white en shiny, en t'other one is
black. De white one gits him to go right a little while, den de black one sil in en gust
it all up. A body can't tell yit which one gwyne to fetch him at de las'. But you is all
right. You gwyne to have considable trouble in yo' life, en considable joy. Sometimes you
gwyne to git hurt, en sometimes you gwyne to git sick; but every time you's gwyne to git
well ag'in. Dey's two gals flyin' 'bout yo' in yo' life. One uv 'em's light en t'other
one is dark. One is rich en t'other is po'. You's gwyne to marry de po' one fust en de
rich one by en by. You wants to keep 'way fum de water as much as you kin, en don't run
no resk, 'kase it's down in de bills dat you's gwyne to git hung. (Twain 19). Huck goes
home and goes up to his room that night and Pap is there.
In Chapter ten, Huck and Jim run into good luck and bad luck. The good luck was Huck and
Jim finds eight dollars in the pocket of an overcoat. After dinner on Friday, they are
lying in the grass, then Huck ran out of tobacco, so he went to the craven to get some,
and finds a rattlesnake. Huck kills it and curled it up and put it on the foot of Jim's
blanket. Night came and Jim flung himself on the blanket and the snake's mate was there,
and it bit Jim on the heel. Jim tells Huck to chop off the snake's head, then skin the
body of the snake and roast a peice of it. He took the rattles off and tied them to Jim
wrist. Jim said it would help him. Huck says I made up my mind I wouldn't ever take
a-holt of a snake-skin again with my hands, now that I see what had come of it. (Twain
52). 
As one can see Superstition plays an important role in the novel Huck Finn. Huck killing
the spider which is bad luck, the hair-ball that tells fortunes, and the rattle-snake
skin that Huck touched are examples that brought bad luck to Huck and Jim in the novel
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.