Huck Finn Timeline

By: Dexter Northcutt

Chapters 1-3

• Symbol: Candle• Quote: “I didn’t need anyone to tell me that

that was an awful dang sign and would fetch me some bad luck…”

• Analysis: This is foreshadowing future events of the book and how superstition plays a major part in this time.

Chapters 4-5

• Symbol: Hairball • Quote: “He said there a spirit inside of it and it

knowed everything”• Analysis: This is also foreshadowing Huck’s

meeting with his father and future events that take place in the book.

Chapters 6-7

• Symbol: Raft• Quote: “Well, all at once here comes a

canoe…”• Analysis: The canoe symbolizes Huck’s chance

at freedom from his abusive father and the start of his adventure.

Chapter 8

• Symbol: Campfire• Quote: “…and all of a sudden I bounded right

onto the ashes of a campfire.”• Analysis: This represents the start of Huck and

Jim working together on a common goal.

Chapter 9

• Symbol: Log Cabin• Quote: “Just before daylight, here we comes a

from house down.” • Analysis: The house is very helpful to Huck’s

and Jim’s adventure and helps lead to Huck’s discovery of what happens after they disappeared.

Chapter 10• Symbol: Rattlesnake• Quote: “And he said that handling a snake-skin

was such awful bad luck that maybe we hadn’t got to the end of it yet.”

• Analysis: This is foreshadowing later events of the book and showing how Huck became more superstitious after Jim’s accident.

Chapter 11

• Symbol: Lead tie• Quote: “And, mind you, when a girl tries to

catch something in her lap she throws her knees apart.”

• Analysis: This shows how wise Mrs. Coftus was and her smart ways to reveal Huck was actually a boy.

Chapter 12

• Symbol: Steamboat• Quote: “It was a steamboat that had killed

herself on a rock.”• Analysis: This is the first major event that Huck

and Jim would get themselves into during their crazy adventures.

Chapter 13

• Symbol: Lantern• Quote: “We seen a light now away down to

the right, on shore.”• Analysis: This shows Huck’s good character as

he came up with a plan to help the criminals.

Chapter 14• Symbol: Crown• Quote: “…dey ain’t no kings here, is dey

Huck?”• Analysis: This chapter exploits the lack of

education of slaves and has the universal truth of you cannot believe everything you’re told.

Chapters 15-18

• Symbol: Gold Coin• Quote: “Here, I’ll put a twenty-dollar gold

piece on this board…”• Analysis: This shows a major shift in Huck’s

character as he no longer feels like he needs to conform to society and turn in Jim.

Chapters 19-21

• Symbol: Note• Quote: “So I give it a shake, and out drops a

little piece of paper with “HALF PAST TWO” wrote on it with a pencil.”

• This foreshadows later events and is a parody of Romeo and Juliet.

Chapters 22-25

• Symbol: Wig• Quote: “He dressed Jim up in King Lear’s outfit

– it was a long curtain – calico gown, and a white horse-hair wig and whiskers.”

• This is the only thing that was keeping Jim from possibly being caught and sold.

Chapter 26

• Symbol: Dictionary• Quote: “I see it warn’t nothing but a

dictionary, so I laid my hand on it and said it. She then looked a little better satisfied.”

• Analysis: This shows how gullible people can be to empty promises and early suspicion of the sisters.

Chapter 27• Symbol: Moneybag• Quote: “I tucked the money-bag in under the

lid, just down beyond where his hands was crossed.”

• Analysis: The moneybag represents Huck’s attempt to help the sisters from the king and the duke.

Chapter 28

• Symbol: Red Cross• Quote: “Well, measles, and whooping-cough,

and erysiplas, and consumption, and yaller janders, and brain fever, and I don’t know what all.”

• Analysis: This is Huck using his lying skills to help Mary Jane.

Chapter 29

• Symbol: Blue Arrow• Quote: “It’s jest a small, thin, blue arrow-

that’s what it is; and if you don’t look clost, you can’t see it.”

• Analysis: This is a turning point because it shows where Huck has a chance to escape the king and the duke.

Chapters 30-35

• Symbol: Trunk• Quote: “Take my trunk in your wagon, and let

on it’s your’n…”• Analysis: This is the beginning of Tom’s

importance in the book and their pact to help Jim.

Chapters 36-37

• Symbol: Knife• Quote: “So we dug and dug with the case-

knives till most midnight.”• Analysis: This represents the pointlessness of

Tom’s ideas to help free Jim.

Chapters 38-39

• Symbol: Harp• Quote: “A jews-harp’s plenty good enough for

a rat. All animals love music.”• Analysis: This is satire but showing how people

use harder means to accomplish simple tasks.

Chapters 40-The Last Chapter• Symbol: Bullet• Quote: “We was all glad as we can be, but Tom

was the gladdest of all because he had a bullet in the calf of his leg.”

• Analysis: This represents the success of rescuing Jim but also the hardships that came afterwards.