Folklore in Huck Finn

After answering the question about the bad luck omens on the first Huckleberry Finn quiz, I realized that much of the novel “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” is based on Folklore and superstition. Many of the critical events and turning points in the novel are foreshadowed by omens and superstitions involved in the folklore of the time.

The time period before Huck meets his father is foreshadowed by multiple signs and omens. The first sign that foreshadows a coming evil is Huck’s killing of a spider in the candle. During the 1800s when Mark Twain was writing Huckleberry Finn, common folklore held that spiders were somewhat immortal so seeing one die was considered a terrible sign. The next superstition that leads Huck to the conclusion that his father is coming is the body found in the river. When the body is first discovered the townspeople agree that it is the body of pap, Huck’s father. However, Huck dispels this claim by stating. “I knowed mighty well a drowned man don’t float on is back, but on his face. So I knowed then, that this warn’t pap, but a woman dressed up in a man’s clothes. So I was uncomfortable again.” Huck again uses folklore to foreshadow his father’s arrival because the body could not be pap because only a woman could drown facing up. The bad omens continue when Huck overturns a salt shaker and is unable to reverse the bad luck because Miss Watson stops him from throwing salt over his shoulder. From this point on Huck realizes that his knowledge of folklore and bad omens is insufficient so he decides to consult someone who is well versed in folklore, Jim.

When Huck discovers a boot print with a cross on the heel, he decides to consult the slave Jim, a master of folklore. Using a hairball, which supposedly contains a spirit, Jim deciphers that Huck’s father is still alive. True to Jim’s prediction later that night Huck returns to his room to find his father waiting for him.

From the discovery of his father, the trend of evil omens and folklore turns and we see the first good omen, the rising of the river. Huck proclaims that the rising river has always brought him good luck. True to the trend of good and bad omens in the book the rising river brings Huck two essential things a canoe and some timber logs. Both turn out to be vital for Huck’s escape plan, the canoe as transport and the logs as a distraction for pap. Also later, the good luck of the rising river continues to hold and a log raft, which furthers the escape plan, is discovered. The good luck of the rising river foreshadows Huck’s escape from his father.

Unfortunately after Huck’s short run of good luck, bad omens quickly follow. On Jackson’s island Huck finds and handles a snakeskin, which according to Jim is one of the worst omens. True to the bad omen the snakeskin leads to Jim being bitten by a rattle snake and becoming ill. Luckily, however, being well versed in folklore Jim knows what to do to combat the snake bite and is able to cure himself. The bad luck continues until the ending of the first part of the novel.

After finding the snake skin, both the raft and the canoe, which were vital for Jim and Huck’s escape, disappear. The bad luck continues when their raft is smashed by a steamboat and they are forced to swim ashore. Huck even highlights these catastrophes as the work of the snake skin by stating “We both knowed well enough it was some more work of the rattlesnake-skin; so what was the use to talk about it?” Clearly Mark Twain wanted to emphasize that the snakeskin had some influence on the events proceeding its discovery.

Clearly much of the first part of Huckleberry Finn is driven by the notion of good and bad omens. This should not be surprising due to the climate of the time period and Mark Twain’s well known infatuation with superstitions and folklore.