Customer Reviews

The Slave Dancer (Laurel-Leaf Historical Fiction)

5 star:		(42)
4 star:		(33)
3 star:		(20)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(31)

 

 

The year is 1840. Thirteen year old Jessie Bollier is walking home through the streets of New Orleans when he is kidnapped. The kidnappers put him on a slaver, a boat that goes to Africa to get slaves and bring them to America to be sold. On his journey he sees the horrors of slavery and he is sickened. The book's title comes from Jessie's job: Jessies job is to play his fife so the slaves will dance and get exercise. Then they can be sold for higher prices. During the journey, to keep the slave ship from being stopped, all but one of the slaves - a young boy named Ras - are thrown into the shark-filled waters. Then a storm hits and Jessie and Ras hide below. Will the ship sink? Will Jessie and Ras survive? Will Jessie be able to go home? To find out, read this exciting book. My favorite part is when Purvis, an older sailor, befriends Jessie by telling him jokes and giving him hope. I recommend this book to people who like historic fiction and who like exciting but sad stories.

I read this novel when it was assigned to my child's fifth grade class. The book provides vivid imagery of a young boy's kidnapping and forced servitude aboard a slave ship. Fox's skillful narrative style is filled with detailed description and allegory. However, I must strongly disagree with Amazon's (and the publisher's?) classification of the novel as a book for 9-12 year olds. The vocabulary is so difficult that myself and my husband, both of us well read, college educated people, did not know some of the words. It also deals with cruel happenings and racism in such a way that I believe make the book suitable only for more mature readers. Therefore, I would recommend this chronicle only for readers 13 years and older.

A mid-70's Newbery winner, and a gem. With Out of the Dust, and Roll of Thunder, Hear my Cry, the very finest Newbery has to offer in historical fiction. The reading level may be late elementary or early middle school, but the content calls for later middle school or high school. The details of abducting and carrying slaves, their treatment at the hands of their transporters, the crude and often cruel behavior of the ship's crew, and the horrors of shipboard life make the themes tough for sensitive younger readers. It will provide a young reader with a thoroughly unsettling look at an unseemly part of American history. The main character, the white boy kidnapped from the streets of New Orleans in 1840 to play his fife to encourage the slaves to dance, is a good, clear, child's view of things, properly aghast and open-minded, the pleasant part of the story and its first person teller. What Slave Dancer gives is brilliant in its clarity and horror. I recommend it highly with the caveats above.

I teach reading to both Junior and Senior high school students so I am always looking for superior adolescent literature. The Slave Dancer, by Paula Fox, winner of the Newbery Medal for most distinguished contribution to American literature for children in 1974, is a good choice.

The novel, set in 1840, revolves around Jesse Boller, a teenage boy from New Orleans. Because Jessie enjoys playing the fife, he is kidnapped and forced to work on The Moonlight, a slave ship. His job is to play the fife while the slaves are forced to dance. I have read elsewhere that dancing the slaves supposedly kept some muscle tone during the long voyage.

We see the voyage through the eyes of young Jesse, a boy who had never thought much about slavery. Men who have compromised with evil and greed surround him and, in a way, he too has been enslaved. During the voyage, he learns about the flawed men who now control his life and the lives of the 98 slaves locked in the hold.
The novel could certainly be used in middle or high school literature, English or even history classes. It is fiction but it depicts historical events well. In my high school reading class we completed the novel in just over six weeks. The book is written for adolescent readers. Sex and violence is told of but not described in lurid detail. However, the `N' word is used to describe the slaves on multiple occasions. Because slavers, not Jesse, use the term, I feel it adds to the brutal picture of the time. A vocabulary list of nautical and archaic terms might be helpful for class reading.

This is not the kind of book you enjoy, this is the kind of book you think about. I recommend it for adolescent or young adult readers.

Kyle Pratt

Jesse Boller is a New Orleans teenager of the 1800s with a fondness for playing the fife. His musical inclination results in big trouble when he is kidnapped and taken to work on a slave ship. His job on the ship is to play the fife while the slaves are forced to "dance," supposedly to keep their bodies strong.

Jesse, who has never given much thought to slavery, recoils at the treatment of the slaves, treatment that was typical for its time, I suspect. Paula Fox does an especially good job of delving into the psyches of the men who voluntarily serve on the ship's crew, people who are not evil by nature, but whose constant rejection of the horror of slavery has inured them to normal human emotion.

A shipwreck during the book's course leads towards a somewhat dubious conclusion. For the most part, though, Fox skillfully carries us into the experience on the ship. We smell the stench, feel the claustrophobic crowding, and experience disbelief and outrage right along with Jesse. This book is a reminder of the unspeakable horrors that people -- even so-called decent people -- can inflict upon each other.

This is a great book. However, it is not for the faint of heart! As a parent of two younger children I am not sure that I would want my ten year old daughter to read this book. The Slave Dancer is the story of a thirteen year old New Orleans boy who is kidnapped and forced to work on a slave ship. This book really made me feel like I was there, watching the pain and agony that surrounded Jessie. I heartily recommend this book for teenagers and adults interested in historical fiction. This book certainly deserved the Newbery Medal in my opinion. I simply couldn't put the book down and finished it in one day. One final caveat, don't read this book if you only like stories where everyone lives happily ever after. This book is about real life, pain and sorrow, grief and rage. But also about friendship, honesty, and courage. To any adults reading this, don't let the kids have all the good stuff. Read this book for yourself; it stacks up favorably against the best of adult fiction.

Jessie is a typical 13 year old boy living in 1840. He has a mother who works as a dress maker and a younger sister. He loves to play the fife. But like any teenager he has a few bad habits. One of which is stopping by the slave yards. Jessie plays his fife close to the docks so he can stop and see what's going on. One day a man gives him a little money for playing. Of course he was grateful.
When he got home his mother was making a dress and needed candle sticks. So Jessie went out to get some. But on the way home he was kidnapped. By none other than the man who had given him money earlier in the day. Terrified he is taken out to sea in a small rowboat. There he boards a large ship he soon comes to know as the Moonlight. He meets the terrible captain and crew and is told he will be working days and playing his fife at night so that the slaves will `dance' and keep their muscles strong and their bodies profitable. Jessie is horrified and disgusted but what choice does he have? After a long time on the trip Jessie has seen nearly more than he can handle. Slaves are beaten, abused, treated like scum and many have even died.
Now a huge storm is coming. Will Jessie be able to survive it? Or will life in the slave trade be too much to handle. Especially since all he has to remember home is two candle sticks.

This book started out somewhat slow but it got much better towards the end. The last few chapters will certainly shock you. Don't pass up Paula Fox's, Slave Dancer. Recommended ages 10 and up.

This book is about aboy named Jessie.He gets taken on a slave ship. He is taken because he plays the flute for the black slaves. He meets the captian, Caqptian Cawthorne, who is cruel. They finally sell the slaves to the Spaniards. The American ship sees them and destroys the boat. He metws a black boy, they become friends, then sometime later Jessie goes back home.
I read this book because it was exciting. I read it because a friend told me about this book. My mom bought it for me. I read it and liked it. It was very interesting. The cover helped me to read this book.
My favorite part was when Jessie met the balck boy named Ras. First they were complete strangers on the ship. Then when the American ship attacked they swam together. They got through the sea and came to an island. THey meet a man nameed Daniel who helps them both get home. They are grateful for surviving this disaster.

How would you like to be kidnapped by a couple of big black men?Thats what happened to the 13 year old named Jessie in the book called The Slave Dancer by Paula Fox and published by Dell publishing in 1973. Jessie was in the market when two men kidnapped him.They put the boy in a burlap bag and took him onto a small raft.Jessie was horrified.After a few days, they came to their destination.A destination that Jessie had never heard of.It was a ship called The Moonlight. The boat carried blacks that would be sold off as slaves.The boys job was to entertain the slaves.He played music on his fife for them.They were weak from diseases but they tried to dance. Jessie somehow ends up on an island that he thinks is deserted.If you would like to know what happens to him read, The Slave Dancer. I would reccomend this book to someone who is mature because of the language and the situations.A lot of the people are racist in this book and have bad names for African Americans.

I chose the book The Slave Dancer By: Paula Fox. This book wasvery interesting to me. It is about a boy who is leading a normallife, and runs an errand for his mother. While he is gone, somesailors kidnap him. When he discovers where he is, it is too late. They have already taken him into the sea. He lives on a boat, which is used to transport slaves, as a ship boy for months. Jessie, the main character, is a good-hearted boy and has trouble being involved in the slave trade. At one point, he is beaten because of his compassion towards the future African slaves. Eventually most of the slaves die, he actually watches some of them be thrown overboard, both living and dead. In the end, the boat sinks, but Jessie and a little boy that he had bonded with earlier survive. However, this book truly hits home with many thoughts of racism today. The discussion of the slaves in general is very good for a child to hear. It portrays how the slaves were treated and how young innocent white boys were made to help in the torture of the slaves. When Jessie feels compassion towards them and is beaten for it, this explains a lot. The captain and others try to make Jessie feel hatred towards these African slaves. This is the way that many people were brought up. With these negative attitudes people have, many of them are raising their children the same way. I think that Paula Fox did a wonderful job of portraying this idea. I looked at this book as a "book people" book. The book is telling the truth in every way possible. It uses great detail in describing some of the events. It even gets gory in some parts. Not many children's books do this, and get by with it. It actually has a Grimm brothers sort of approach. Fox tells things the way they were; she does not "soften" them up for the children. The other side, however, would say the book was not fit for children due to the gore of it and even some language. In an article written by Sarah Hinlicky entitled "Don't Write About Race", she discusses the topic of race in writing, including children's literature. Hinlicky gives many good reasons why people don't write about racial issues. Hinlicky says that one of the main reasons is fear. She says that "the wise writer observes the rules and politely declines to write about race." This keeps them from being tortured and ridiculed for writing about racial issues. In the end of the article she proposes a very powerful statement: Black America and white America are different cultures, these cultures still distrust one another. Moving across color lines also means moving across culture lines...Maybe there's an answer I've found, but I think I'd better quit now, since I'm not supposed to be writing about race in the first place. This statement is important in saying how people think they aren't supposed to discuss the topic. I think it is almost challenging for people to look at it in Hinlicky's light. I think I take a book people stand. Children need to know the truth in the history of acts such as this. They cannot keep the truth from the children, or that will lead to children who have racial tension. Many children today are misinformed of this part of history. Both black children and white children are confused with their facts in this matter. Fox describes Jessie's story very well. Jessie is made to feel hatred towards these slaves. He is given no choice. This is the way many children are today. They believe what they hear from their parents, teachers, and books. Some of this information may be true, but most of it just confuses the children even more. The Slave Dancer should be an important part of education everywhere in America. It tells the story well, of both the slaves and the people who were forced to help in their trade. Hinlicky's article would also be a good article to teach children as a reference to The Slave Dancer.