Lovecraft Country

In Lovecraft Country, blood is a symbol for the characters’ ancestry. Atticus is an African American who is never allowed to forget his genetic makeup. Atticus’s blood means that he is a second-class citizen in his own country, with his blood functioning as the physical representation of this heritage of segregation. As an African American, his blood can be spilled without repercussions. White violence and oppression reveal how little his blood matters to society. His blood is important, ironically, in that he can never escape his African American identity, and unimportant in that it makes him a target for oppression. This constant duality of Atticus’s blood reflects the perpetual anxiety of African Americans in the 1950s America of the book’s setting and also in contemporary America.

However, Atticus learns that his heritage—symbolized by his blood—is more powerful than he expected. The Braithwhites teach Atticus that he shares their bloodline and, as such, is imbued with magical power. This means that his blood has a unique potency. He uses his blood to open doorways and cast spells, illustrating the innate symbolic power of the bloodline. The irony of this is that Atticus’s blood and identity remain exactly the same.