• Slave Dancer (Reprint) - Ingram
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Aladdin Paperbacks, 2008-01-09

Slave Dancer (Reprint)

Slave Dancer (Reprint)

Paula Fox, Author

Paperback

9781416971399

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In this powerful, Newbery Medal-winning classic, a 13-year-old boy is kidnapped and brought aboard a slave ship, where he is forced to play music that will entice the slaves to exercise. Illustrations.
  • Make Way for Books Annotation

In the midst of the brutality of the slave trade, a young boy is forced to dance for the entertainment of a ship’s crew. His journey through fear, complicity, and the moral dilemmas of survival speaks to the challenges of courage, morality, and personal growth. A vivid, haunting narrative that challenges readers to confront history’s painful truths. NOTE: The novel’s weighty themes of slavery, morality, and survival make it more appropriate for readers in grades 6–8, inviting thoughtful discussion on difficult topics while encouraging resilience and critical thinking.

Keywords and Themes: African American & Black • Award Winner • Bravery • Classics • Courage • Determination • Freedom • Growth • Historical • Hope • Justice • Juvenile Fiction • Morality • Sacrifice • Survival • United States - 19th Century

Readability • 6.0

Age Range • 11-14

Pages • 192

Subjects • Slave trade • Slave ships • Slavery • Transatlantic voyages • Slaves • Ocean voyages • Historical fiction • Sea fiction

Categories • Juvenile Fiction | Classics • Juvenile Fiction | Historical | United States - 19th Century • Juvenile Fiction | African American & Black

In this iconic, wrenching Newbery Medal winning book, a young Louisiana boy faces the horrors of slavery when he is kidnapped and forced to work on a slave ship.

Thirteen-year-old Jessie Bollier earns a few pennies playing his fife on the docks of New Orleans. One night, on his way home, a canvas is thrown over his head and he's knocked unconscious. When he wakes up, Jessie finds himself aboard a slave ship, bound for Africa. There, the Moonlight picks up ninety-eight black prisoners, and the men, women, and children, chained hand and foot, are methodically crammed into the ship's hold. Jessie's job is to provide music for the slaves to dance to on the ship's deck--not for amusement but for exercise, as a way to keep their muscles strong and their bodies profitable.

Over the course of the long voyage, Jessie grows more and more sickened by the greed of the sailors and the cruelty with which the slaves are treated. But it's one final horror, when the Moonlight nears her destination, that will change Jessie forever.

Set during the middle of the nineteenth century, when the illegal slave trade was at its height, The Slave Dancer not only tells a vivid and shocking story of adventure and survival but depicts the brutality of slavery with unflinching historical accuracy.

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