47 By Walter Mosley pg1- pg 80

Summary: So, new book new story. This book seems to be a little more interesting than i had thought it would be when I first looked at it. This book begins in times of slavery on a plantation called the Corinthian Plantation. This story is told from a young slave boy actually named 47. This book starts off with the boy 47 being very young. So his story is that his mother was a well liked house slave who would calm the masters wife when she had like anxiety attacks and things like that. So 47's mom ran off to another plantation and fell in love with another slave there. Long story short she became pregnant and died giving birth to 47. After she died the masters wife had an attack and she ended up dieing as well because she dint have 47's mom there to calm her with her beautiful voice. So when his wife dies the slave master cant do anything but blame 47 for what happened to his wife, so he cant wait for him to get older so he can work him out on the cotton Field. So after his mother dies he is raised by an old house lady slave called Big Mama Flore. She raises him and looks after him. She also doesn't feed him any meat or gives him milk because in doing this he wouldn't grow then he wouldn't have to work in the Fields. But after a while the master says hes big enough and sticks him out in the cotton Fields. When he gets there he gets tortured at first but then is looked after by some of the biggest, strongest and most respected slaves on the Field. Champ who was the strongest became 47's bunk partner and Mud Albert who was very close with the master, so close that he actually is in charge of the slaves while the master was busy . So he had the best slaves looking after him and making sure no harm came to him.



Quote: " You really too little to be workin' in the Field yet. I don't know what Master Tobias was thinkin' to put you out here like that. But as long as you here I need you to know what it is to chop cotton. And now that you know Ima' put you out chere as a runnah for the slaves. "(Mosley35)



Reaction: So this quote is actually from Mud Albert one morning after he had 47 working in the cotton fields for a few days. So him being the nice and thoughtful slave that he is he gives 47 a new job. He gives 47 the job to basically get water and things like that for the slaves in the cotton field that are actually picking cotton and doing work. So hes basically a erin runner.