The Well : David's Story

Rating:
Summary: BLACK vs. WHITE
Review: How do you convey the horror of slavery, the very degradation of it, to small children? How can you tell a story where these problems aren't watered down and accepted in some way? "The Well" renders these requirements so perfectly that it's a crime and a shame that it wasn't even a Newberry Honor book. This story plays with the reader through a million different methods. Throughout the story the characters are fighting between pride and survival. The boy, Hammer, refuses to react like anything less than a human being, equal to his peers in the face of antagonism. The fact that his peers happen to be the nasty racist Simms brothers only adds gas to the flame. Subsequently, the reader is torn. On the one hand, it is infinitely satisfying to read about Hammer pounding the horrid Charlie Simms into pulp. On the other hand, you can't help but feel like giving Hammer a quick slap to the face when, after finishing months of hard toil on the Simms farm for the beating Hammer gave Charlie, the book simply says, "Hammer made a point of going back to the Simmses' farm, found Charlie alone, and knocked him down. Again". It's a brilliant sentence with so many loaded emotions behind it you'd like to scream. Taylor's language is adept at conveying the real horrors of the time. Ma Rachel's tale of how her mother was whipped in an attempt to keep her child's name is an echo of the scene in the mini-series "Roots" when Kunta Kinte is told to call himself "Toby". This book is chock full of violence and hatred. It is, in many ways, perfect. The author's choice of not dividing the text into chapters is particularly interesting. Some difficulty might be had reading it aloud, if only because there are only natural stopping points. "The Well" would pair well with other tales of intolerance, even Taylor's other books from that time period. It is a beautiful tale.

Rating:
Summary: BLACK vs. WHITE
Review: I gave this book five stars because it was like you were in the olden days when blacks and whites were against each other. This book is about two boys named David and Hammer. They live in Mississippi. During the summer time there is usual a drought. But the Logan's well doesn't dry up. And they share their water with everybody who's anybody. Well one day Hammer and David were bringing their cows back from the Rosa Lee and they meet Charlie with a wheel off of his wagon. Well he asks Hammer and David to help him get it back on. So David said he would help him even though he has a busted leg. Charlie took a long time to put the wheel back on and David said he couldn't hold it much longer. So he dropped it and Charlie fell back with the wheel. He got up and hit David and he fell down. Then Hammer came over and jumped on Charlie and started to hit him. Then Charlie fell back and hit his head on a rock and it knocked him out. It is not legal to hit a white man. You could get hung.

The setting was in Mississippi during the summer time. It was during the 1800's, in the post slavery era.

Rating:
Summary: Outstanding storytelling!
Review: The Well by Mildred D. Taylor is one of the best examples of juvenile fiction that I have read in the last ten years. (Coming from a teacher, that's a lot of books!) The reader is invited into a world where whites can say and do as they please and blacks are treated to cruelty, deceit and humiliation. Yet the Logan family, the central characters of this book, maintain their strength and dignity through it all. The Logan property sits on the only well that has not run dry in this turn-of-the-century tale of the Deep South. They are generous people and share their sweet water with all their neighbours, even the bigotted Simms clan. David Logan, the narrator, tells us how he and his brother Hammer cope with the abuse and terrors inflicted upon them by the Simms boys and their evil father, Old Man McCallister Simms. This short novel tells us much about the deep seated racism that was so much a part of that time and place. The characters are quickly and clearly brought to life, the setting is vividly drawn and despite the frequent - but historically accurate use of the N word - this book is a great "read aloud."

Rating:
Summary: Book Review : The Well
Review: The Well is a very compelling and resonant book by Mildred D. Taylor, the Newberry Award winner for Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry. You will experience many emotions while reading this book, which are not limited to anger and sadness .The Well is set in the south during the mid 1910's, a time in which deep-rooted racism is practiced and where whites can do and say anything they please with abandon to blacks.
David Logan tells a poignant story of his boyhood in Smallsville, Mississippi when blacks could be hanged for considering themselves as equals to whites. The Logan family, the main characters in the book, are among few black families to own land. During an awful drought, they have the only well of sweet water in the whole town of Smallsville. The author eloquently describes how the Logan's believe that the water is not theirs to hoard but gods gift to share with black and white folks alike. Everyone is grateful to the Logan's except the white Simms family who hate being obliged to blacks. David's family lives by his father's words, 'use your head not your fists' but his insubordinate hotheaded brother Hammer is sick of the constant degrading of Charlie Simses and when Charlie pushes his handicapped brother with bitter rancor to the ground, Hammer reacts and does the unthinkable.
The characters are quickly and clearly brought into life, the setting is vividly drawn despite the frequent but historical use of the N word. The large cast of characters is masterfully individualized with opinions, beliefs, personalities and ways of life. I personally gained tremendous admiration for Mildred D. Taylor as an author for making such a luring plot seem so stupendous in a small book.