Reading this as an adult, I realize that this is one of those "a dog and his boy" books that is not really about the dog at all. If I had read it as a child, I think I would have fallen into despair, because even in other books where -- SPOILER ALERT -- the dog dies, there is at least some redemptive, hopeful moment, as with the fern in Where the Red Fern Grows (which still makes me cry). The matter-of-fact realism of Armstrong's window into the situation of black sharecroppers in our not-so-distant past provides no light of hope; the reader, looking back, must bring her own to the book, and that is a difficult task. This is a short book, ostensibly for children, and it has beautiful moments, but read it only when you are prepared to feel real sadness.

A boy who lives with his parents on a small piece of land. Has a very special dog. However, his family is going hungry, so his father had to steal food so the family would not starve. The sheriff and his posse came to their house to take the father away. Sounder the dog did not like it, the boy tried to hold the dog back, but when the wagon was pulling away the dog got loose and went after the wagon. One of the men shot the dog. Throughout the book, the boy keeps hoping the dog comes home. He visits his dad one time in jail, but his dad told him to never come again. In the end the dad and the dog comes back, but the dog eventually dies.

The book was okay. It brought to mind how it really was back then. Some people never even had a chance to prove if they were innocent or not. It is a good dog story; one that many people would enjoy reading.

Activities:
Talk to the children and have them tell you why they think the dad went to jail, and whether it is fair or not.

Have them draw a picture from some part of the book.

Here's a little synopsis:"A landmark in children's literature, winner of the 1970 Newbery Medal, and the basis of an acclaimed film, Sounder traces the keen sorrow and the abiding faith of a poor African-American boy in the 19th-century South. The boy's father is a sharecropper, struggling to feed his family in hard times. Night after night, he and his great coon dog, Sounder, return to the cabin empty-handed. Then, one morning, almost like a miracle, a sweet-smelling ham is cooking in the family's kitchen. At last the family will have a good meal. But that night, an angry sheriff and his deputies come, and the boy's life will never be the same."I enjoyed this book. I had a hard time getting into it at the beginning but I quickly got into it after that. My only regret is that the book is really short, only 116 small pages and I wish the story had been longer. It was really interesting to read about what life was like for African-Americans in the south at this time. It was also interesting to see how they talked. Words like follard instead of followed. The story was well written and I could see an 19th-century southern boy telling the story as it is written.By far my favourite quote is this: "The boy had once heard that some people had so many books they only readeach book once. But the boy was sure there were not that many books in theworld." ( )

The setting is what makes the book for me. Want a picture of how bad a sharecropper's life could be? Read Sounder. Want an idea of how black men were treated in the South? Read Sounder. This isn't a tale of a lynch mob or even Jim Crow laws. It's a tale of the effects of run-of-the-mill treatment of blacks by whites under trying economic circumstances. He doesn't get to go to school. The owner of the fields separates his sharecroppers cabins so they can't be part of a community. Whites routinely harass blacks. The jailer breaks apart the boys gift to his jailed father.

(Full review at my blog) ( )

This 1970 Newbery winner, about a family of black sharecroppers and their dog, Sounder, is very sad. It is bitter cold, hunting is poor, so the father steals a ham and pork sausage to feed his wife and four children. When he is arrested and hauled away in a wagon, Sounder breaks free from the oldest son to chase it and is shot, but survives. The father is sentenced to many years of hard labor on a chain gang. His oldest son takes over his work in the fields, providing for the family and even learning to read. He looks for his father when he is not working, encountering more prejudice and cruel treatment. Both Sounder and the father return but are badly maimed and die before the end of the book.

Sounder has earned some criticism in the ensuing years, primarily because a white author is writing about a black experience. Armstrong says in an author’s note at the beginning of Sounder that it is the story of an African American teacher (Charles Jones) who worked for Armstrong’s father after school and in the summer, and who taught Armstrong to read.

In an interview in the March 1978 Writer's Digest, Armstrong said race was not a factor when writing the book. "I was writing about people's hearts and feelings. There's no color to feeling. There's no color to heart. There are a lot of white people who have suffered indignities, but they strangely hold out against it and save themselves. And there's a lot of black people who have done the same thing."

Many of these same critics take Armstrong to task for not naming any of the characters other than the dog. For example, Albert Schwartz (in MacCann and Woodard’s The Black American in Books for Children: Readings in Racism, 1972) says leaving them unnamed “raises the issue of white supremacy” and “deep-seated prejudice has long denied human individualization to the Black person.”

In the Writer’s Digest interview, Armstrong states, "If the boy's age was not given the reader could become a part of the story: 'The boy must be about my age.' Place and time kept vague, no name or description of the boy. . . . And no names for the family. With names they would have represented one family; without names they became universal-- representing all people who suffer privation and injustice, but through love, self-respect, devotion, and desire for improvement, make it in the world." Indeed, the setting is vague enough that it could be anytime between the end of the Civil War and the Great Depression, and anywhere walnuts grow (which is most of the eastern half of the United States, not just the South).

According to Lois Kuznets (in the Spring 1978 Illinois English Bulletin), the original manuscript of Sounder was much longer. Armstrong's publishers split it into two novels; the second is Sour Land (1971) and tells the story of the boy (now named Moses Waters) as an adult.

Well-known actor Avery Brooks (Star Trek DS9’s Captain Sisko) did a marvelous job narrating the audiobook, even singing some of the hymns in the story. His bass voice was perfect for that and for everyone but the mother. He gives the white characters deep southern accents, not necessarily reflected in their words in the book.

Although Sounder is written at about a grade 4.9-5.3 reading level, its subject matter is more appropriate for middle grades (6-8) and up. It is hard to fathom such a harsh punishment for stealing a ham and sausages, and the cruelties the black family and the dog endure. There is also some scenes (on pages 59-61) where the boy imagines, in grisly detail, what he would do to the deputy who shot Sounder (drag him behind a wagon) and the jailer who destroys a homemade cake the boy brings his father, awaiting trial (choke him with a chain).

[This review also appears on The Newbery Project and Bookin' It] ( )