A response to The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.
Thinking back on childhood, you can think of many instances of childish belief, and superstitions that now seem so irrational and impossible, that it’s hard to imagine that you yourself had once believed in such things. The truth is, however, that you did once believe in such things as black cats bringing bad luck and putting pennies in your shoes to make good things happen, and so went around stepping over cracks in the sidewalk and avoiding ladders at all costs. In Mark Twain’s book Tom Sawyer, every decision that Tom makes is affected by superstitions, from getting rid of warts to deciding whether or not he was going to get a new suit; he lost plenty of his prized marbles because of one superstition, and was saved from Injun Joe because of another. Superstitions are powerful things, affecting the decisions of those who believe in them, thus affecting the events of their lives, for better or worse.
Everyone in the romantic world of Tom Sawyer has a strong belief in the superstitions they use in every task they perform, even when their superstitious charms don’t work. When Tom loses some of his marbles, he relies on a supposedly fail-proof superstition, which makes all the marbles he ever lost come to collect in one spot, then blames a witch when he returns to his charmed spot and finds that the marbles have not returned after all. He doesn’t take into account the fact that he’d tried this trick several times before, and doesn’t bother to think why a witch would bother the charm him out of his marbles, if witches even exist. Then, to confirm his belief, Tom turns to yet another superstition, the informative ‘doodle bug’, and counts his suspicions as proved when that, too, fails, as the bug appears, only to dive back under the sand in fright at the sight of the boy in front of him. Even the adults in the book, who are supposed to be above such things, have their strong beliefs in superstitions; when the wound on the body of the dead doctor bled, the towns people took it to mean that Muff Potter was the murderer-though it turned out to be a false accusation-and used bread stuffed with quicksilver in the attempt to find the allegedly drowned boys, bringing forth fruitless results.
Strong beliefs in superstition can change or cause events in a person’s life. During the time Tom and Huckleberry Finn were digging for treasure, they postponed their hunt due to the day being Friday, as well as Huck having a nightmare about rats; both were bad signs in the boys’ superstition, so they stopped digging for the day rather than explore the haunted house, where Injun Joe would have caught them. The whole reason Injun Joe was even after Tom and Huck was because they had been in the graveyard at the time he murdered Doctor Robinson, trying to get rid of warts with an old superstition involving devils and a dead cat. If Tom and Huck had not gone to the graveyard, they wouldn’t have seen the ordeal and wouldn’t be witnesses of Injun Joe’s crimes and deceptions, which would mean Injun Joe wouldn’t have a reason to be after them. In the real world, people can go around avoiding ladders and black cats for most of their child hood, but, because they stayed away from these things, there was less of a chance of the ladder or something from the top of the ladder falling down on them, or of catching parasites or illnesses carried by stray cats. Either of these things would have had some kind of affect on the person’s life, though the affects probably wouldn’t be that dramatic.
The changes in the events of a person’s life due to superstition can be good or bad. The dead cat superstition caused Tom and Huck to sneak away during the night, which can be dangerous and would certainly get any boy in trouble, but because they were at the graveyard, they saw the murder, which made the two boys able to save Muff Potter from being hung. The cannon superstition the searchers used to look for the non-existent bodies of Tom, Huck, and Joe wasn’t very smart; shooting off a cannon at random poses more than just minor dangers, as the people shooting the cannon would find it difficult to see innocent bystanders that just happen to be boating down the river. However, the cannon showed the boys on the island that they really were missed, which led to Tom sneaking back home and hatching the plan that brought the three runaways home to a welcome fit for heroes. There’s many a time when children go out on adventures for four-leaf clovers or other superstitious talismans, and experience heartache when it’s discovered that the good luck charms aren’t magic after all, and the day’s been seemingly wasted by a wild goose chase in the park. While looking for these charms, however, a person can find so many other things; the beauty of nature, if looking in woods or parks, the importance of friendship if searching with a partner. Sometimes, though, the wonders along the journey are forgotten, wasted on the searcher, and the only thing gained is the knowledge that good luck charms are a hoax, often not even that, when the superstitious talismans aren’t found at all, resulting in an unhappy child, feeling betrayed by their beliefs.
Superstitions are white lies, imaginary beliefs, playing on the imagination, and affecting decisions of those who care to believe in them. Some have practical purposes; made up by adults trying to keep children out of trouble in ways they would understand better than simply being told, like walking under ladders or breaking mirrors. Others were most likely invented to influence the decisions of others with the future in mind; the superstition that putting pennies in shoes brings good luck was probably meant to teach children to save their money, while avoiding outright telling them. Still other superstitions have no purpose at all, creations of children, adults, coincidence, and even literature; Tom Sawyer’s howling dog prophecy more likely than not began in a story brought to the characters’ attention, as howling dogs are used to symbolize tragic events to come in literature. No matter what the purpose for superstitions, they are powerful things, changing the flow of people’s lives, effecting their decisions, and teaching some important lessons, if a person bothers to watch out for them. Indeed, life as we know it would be very different without superstitions; anyone can deny it as much as they want, but we’d miss so much of what we have now, that superstition could very well be one of the most powerful things there are.
Thinking back on childhood, you can think of many instances of childish belief, and superstitions that now seem so irrational and impossible, that it’s hard to imagine that you yourself had once believed in such things. The truth is, however, that you did once believe in such things as black cats bringing bad luck and putting pennies in your shoes to make good things happen, and so went around stepping over cracks in the sidewalk and avoiding ladders at all costs. In Mark Twain’s book Tom Sawyer, every decision that Tom makes is affected by superstitions, from getting rid of warts to deciding whether or not he was going to get a new suit; he lost plenty of his prized marbles because of one superstition, and was saved from Injun Joe because of another. Superstitions are powerful things, affecting the decisions of those who believe in them, thus affecting the events of their lives, for better or worse.
Everyone in the romantic world of Tom Sawyer has a strong belief in the superstitions they use in every task they perform, even when their superstitious charms don’t work. When Tom loses some of his marbles, he relies on a supposedly fail-proof superstition, which makes all the marbles he ever lost come to collect in one spot, then blames a witch when he returns to his charmed spot and finds that the marbles have not returned after all. He doesn’t take into account the fact that he’d tried this trick several times before, and doesn’t bother to think why a witch would bother the charm him out of his marbles, if witches even exist. Then, to confirm his belief, Tom turns to yet another superstition, the informative ‘doodle bug’, and counts his suspicions as proved when that, too, fails, as the bug appears, only to dive back under the sand in fright at the sight of the boy in front of him. Even the adults in the book, who are supposed to be above such things, have their strong beliefs in superstitions; when the wound on the body of the dead doctor bled, the towns people took it to mean that Muff Potter was the murderer-though it turned out to be a false accusation-and used bread stuffed with quicksilver in the attempt to find the allegedly drowned boys, bringing forth fruitless results.
Strong beliefs in superstition can change or cause events in a person’s life. During the time Tom and Huckleberry Finn were digging for treasure, they postponed their hunt due to the day being Friday, as well as Huck having a nightmare about rats; both were bad signs in the boys’ superstition, so they stopped digging for the day rather than explore the haunted house, where Injun Joe would have caught them. The whole reason Injun Joe was even after Tom and Huck was because they had been in the graveyard at the time he murdered Doctor Robinson, trying to get rid of warts with an old superstition involving devils and a dead cat. If Tom and Huck had not gone to the graveyard, they wouldn’t have seen the ordeal and wouldn’t be witnesses of Injun Joe’s crimes and deceptions, which would mean Injun Joe wouldn’t have a reason to be after them. In the real world, people can go around avoiding ladders and black cats for most of their child hood, but, because they stayed away from these things, there was less of a chance of the ladder or something from the top of the ladder falling down on them, or of catching parasites or illnesses carried by stray cats. Either of these things would have had some kind of affect on the person’s life, though the affects probably wouldn’t be that dramatic.
The changes in the events of a person’s life due to superstition can be good or bad. The dead cat superstition caused Tom and Huck to sneak away during the night, which can be dangerous and would certainly get any boy in trouble, but because they were at the graveyard, they saw the murder, which made the two boys able to save Muff Potter from being hung. The cannon superstition the searchers used to look for the non-existent bodies of Tom, Huck, and Joe wasn’t very smart; shooting off a cannon at random poses more than just minor dangers, as the people shooting the cannon would find it difficult to see innocent bystanders that just happen to be boating down the river. However, the cannon showed the boys on the island that they really were missed, which led to Tom sneaking back home and hatching the plan that brought the three runaways home to a welcome fit for heroes. There’s many a time when children go out on adventures for four-leaf clovers or other superstitious talismans, and experience heartache when it’s discovered that the good luck charms aren’t magic after all, and the day’s been seemingly wasted by a wild goose chase in the park. While looking for these charms, however, a person can find so many other things; the beauty of nature, if looking in woods or parks, the importance of friendship if searching with a partner. Sometimes, though, the wonders along the journey are forgotten, wasted on the searcher, and the only thing gained is the knowledge that good luck charms are a hoax, often not even that, when the superstitious talismans aren’t found at all, resulting in an unhappy child, feeling betrayed by their beliefs.
Superstitions are white lies, imaginary beliefs, playing on the imagination, and affecting decisions of those who care to believe in them. Some have practical purposes; made up by adults trying to keep children out of trouble in ways they would understand better than simply being told, like walking under ladders or breaking mirrors. Others were most likely invented to influence the decisions of others with the future in mind; the superstition that putting pennies in shoes brings good luck was probably meant to teach children to save their money, while avoiding outright telling them. Still other superstitions have no purpose at all, creations of children, adults, coincidence, and even literature; Tom Sawyer’s howling dog prophecy more likely than not began in a story brought to the characters’ attention, as howling dogs are used to symbolize tragic events to come in literature. No matter what the purpose for superstitions, they are powerful things, changing the flow of people’s lives, effecting their decisions, and teaching some important lessons, if a person bothers to watch out for them. Indeed, life as we know it would be very different without superstitions; anyone can deny it as much as they want, but we’d miss so much of what we have now, that superstition could very well be one of the most powerful things there are.
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