Review Detail

Reader reviewed by Nix

Roll Of Thunder Hear My Cry - Mildred .D. Taylor

A novel that raised strong emotions within me was Roll Of Thunder Hear my Cry By Mildred Taylor. It opened my eyes to racial injustice as it shows how unjustly blacks were treated in Mississippi in the 1930s. It focused on the black Logan Family who were unjustly treated by most of the while families in the novel.
The author highlights the theme of racism through first person narrative. The story is told by the main character, a nine year old black girl Cassie Logan. As the story is told from the point of view of a child, she says things that are simple, but that makes things easier to understand:
No day in my life had ever been as cruel as this one.
The word cruel lets me understand how Cassie feels, and how she had been treated. The reader has a direct link with Cassie because she has been speaking directly to them. It makes us become involved in the story, especially with Cassies feelings and thoughts which makes me have more sympathy towards Cassie and her family.
Taylor captured my feelings yet again through the characters who were victims of the racial incidents. Cassies mother, Mary Logan, was a teacher at the black school. One day the school was supplied with books which were said to be new. When the pupils opened the books, they were shocked to find a racial remark:
10 September 1931 Poor White
11 September 1932 Poor White
12 September 1933 Very Poor Nigra
The words Very Poor Nigra proves the state only gives things to the black schools if the whites are finished with them. When Mrs Logan found this out she glued paper on top of it so no offensive comment would be seen. Mrs Logan did not care if this got her in trouble as she was self confident and a strong female character. If anyone was to notice, they would have had to come to school to do so, where they would see what else the school needed. Mrs Logan represents a newly emerging independent minded class of black citizen.
The Berry family were also victims of a racial attack. The Berrys were tarred and feathered for no good reason:
The face had no nose, and the head no hair; and the skin was scarred,burned and the lips were wizened black like char coal
The simile wizened black like char coal made me envisage someone with a lot of crumbly wrinkles. How could one human do this to another human and get away with it? The Wallaces who committed this crime never got punished for this as they were white.
The author uses many incidents in her novel to show how racist the whites were towards the blacks. Mr Morrison was brought home from Cassies father, David Logans, work as whites were fighting with him and he got the blame of it as he is black. Mr Morrison is a tall muscular man with a few scars on his face. He tells the story of what happened to his family one night, and how the night men came:
Burst in on us with their rebel sabers hacking and killing, burning us out. Didnt care who they kilt. We warnt nothing to them. No better than Dogs. Kilt babies and old women. Didnt matter.
The phrase We warnt nothing to them. Suggests that they didnt do it for a purpose, just for the sake of it, because they were black. Mr Morrison frightened Cassie that night because it was the night men who killed his family.
Another incident earlier in the novel, the children were walking to school and the white childrens school bus was driving so fast and close to the black children they had to run up side streets to stop the bus from catching them:
Little Man turned around and watched saucer eyed as a bus bore down on him sewing clouds of red dust like a huge yellow breathing dragon fire.
The simile Clouds of red dust like a huge yellow dragon breathing fire, conveys an image of a large dangerous object speeding threateningly towards them, with red dust everywhere which makes it look like fire. The children are angry because all the white childrens faces are looking at the black children and they are laughing.
A further incident was when the children came up with a plan to get them their well deserved revenge. They decide to make a ditch in the road so the bus cant get out of it and the children have to walk home. They dug the ditch before they went to school and by the time they ran to it after school it was filled with water. This turned out to be worse than they had planned:
But instead of the graceful glide through the puddle that its occupants were expecting, the bus emitted a tremendous crack and careened drunkenly into our trap.
The word drunkenly describes how the bus was moving in the puddle. It was as if they were staggering into it. The Logan children felt guilty but pleased at the same time for doing this, they could finally stand back and laugh at the blacks for once in their lives. Most of the white children were having to unhappily walk home and walk around the same distance as the black children do every day. Attacking the bus was a minor thing to do after all of the things the whites had done to the blacks.
The climax of the novel continues to hold my attention to the theme, especially when we find out what the night riders do to T.J. Avery and his family. Although T.J. didnt do everything correct in life, it was no excuse to harm him and his family:
Mr and Mrs Avery were dragged savagely by their feet from the house.The Avery girls were thrown through the open windows. The older girls,attempting to gather the younger children to them, were slapped back and spat upon. Then quiet, gentle Claude was hauled out, knocked to the ground and kicked.
The phrase slapped back and spat upon uses violent verbs which conveys how the whites dont care about the blacks. When David Logan found out what had happened he set fire to his own important land, which he had worked all his life on and which meant so much to his family, just for the Averys sake. The Land was important to everyone blacks and whites, they all worked together to put the fire out. It was nice to see everyone working together. David Logan done this to postpone the death of T.J. Avery which inevitably had to happen.
Roll Of Thunder Hear My Cry therefor defiantly opened my eyes to what went on in Mississippi in the 1930s. Sadly it is not just in Mississippi that racism takes place, and it wasnt just in the 1930s that racism occurred. Racism occurs today, The author made me realise that there is pain in life no matter what the colour, and that there is good and bad in all walks of life.