Succession in Telling a Story
Paula Fox, a widely respected author, writes books for children and young adults. Mrs.
Fox was born April 23, 1923 in New York City to Paul Hervey and Elsie Fox. Paula
primarily writes children $BCT (J books, but she has branched out and written eight
adult novels. Some of Paula Fox $BCT (J many literary credentials include winning the
National Book Award in 1983 for her novel $BE" (J Place Apart, $BG (Jand Paula Fox also
won the Newberry Medal in 1974 for this novel being discussed, $BE5 (Jhe Slave Dancer
$BG (J
Paula Fox $BCT (J ambition for writing $BE5 (Jhe Slave Dancer $BG (Jwas to entertain
children and young adults, and yet at the same time, providing them with a more accurate
explanation of the slave trade--both on the trade and the people behind it. One very
good example of the cruelty toward slaves in the book was the passage when Captain
Hawthorne, the Captain of The Moonlight, spotted the American ship that was going to free
the slaves on board his ship.
$BE A# (Jy God! $BC G (JCawthorne thundered. $BA* (J see the ship! I see it. It
$BCT (J American! You disaster stout{a crew member} You $BCW (Je murdered me! Get the
slaves over! Get them over! $BC (J I cried out in terror as I saw the luminous crest of
a wave in the darkness, and right behind it on the next crest, a number of small boats
coming directly at us, the rowers bent against the wind. At that moment, Sam Wick picked
up a black woman and simply dropped her over the side. With hardly a pause he then
kicked over two men. Now the slaves, aware of their mortal danger, sank down, piling
themselves up on one another as though in this way they could protect themselves. They
scratched the deck frantically as the seamen ran among them, grabbing them up and shoving
them to the rail, three black men moved unsteadily toward him, flailing the air with
their arms as though he were a wild animal. Cawthorne instantly drew his pistol and
fired it directly into the face of one of the blacks, and proceeded to shoot four more
woman and children......... $BGi (J
That scene seems like it came out of a fiction movie, but it did not. Many of these
tragic occurrences happened every day on slave boats. But the great ability of Paula Fox
to weave a seemingly perfect replication of actual history in a book is amazing. Has she
succeeded? Most definitely yes. Many of these powerful passages from the story
illustrate the cruelty faced by millions of slaves for nearly three centuries. Many of
these such occurrences in the story greatly altered Jessie's views about the goodness of
man, his outlook on life, and his fears involving the slaves. Another good example in
the novel is when Jessie is reflecting on his experience in the closing pages of the
novel.
$BE* (Jn the war between the states, I fought on the Union side and a year after the
Emancipation Proclamation in 1864, I spent three months in Andersonville, surviving the
horrors, I often thought, because I $BCE (J been prepared for them on The Moonlight.
After the war, my life went on much like my neighbors $BC (Jlives. I no longer spoke
of my journey on a slave ship back in 1840. I did not think of it myself. Time softened
my memory as though it was kneading wax. But there was one thing that did not yield to
time.
I was unable to listen to music. I could not bear to hear a woman sing, and at the
sound of any instrument, a fiddle, a flute, a drum, a comb with paper wrapped around it
played by my own child, I would leave instantly and shut myself away. For at the first
note of a tune or of a song, I would see once again as thought they $BCE (J never ceased
their dancing in my mind, black men and women and children lifting their tormented limbs
in time to reedy martial air, the dust rising from their joyless thumping, the sound of
the fife finally drowned beneath the clanging of their chains. $BGi (J
Paula Fox $BCT (J careful and tedious description of the crew $BCT (J voyage on The
Moonlight has created a saddening image of just what it was really like in the ship.
The torture of slaves, the hardships faced by the crew, and the mental changes that went
on in Jessie $BCT (J head. These changes resulted in Jessie never being to listen to
music again, to preparing him for the grueling hardships of war, and to rething his moral
values on Man. Mrs. Fox has done a wonderful job in writing this book--making it
entertaining, yet informal; and also giving the book wide appeal for boys and girls of
all ages.
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