The Water Dancer (Oprah's Book Club): A Novel by Ta-Nehisi Coates: Conversation Starters

By dailyBooks

The Water Dancer (Oprah's Book Club): A Novel by Ta-Nehisi Coates: Conversation Starters

Set in the 1800s, before the start of the Civil War, The Water Dancer is the first fiction novel by author Ta-Nehisi Coates. The book is a story of a young boy named Hiram Walker, born in slavery, in the plantations of antebellum Virginia. Hiram has a photographic memory but doesn’t remember his mother as she was sold by his father to the plantation owner when Hiram was young. He is also the possessor of a superhuman ability called ‘Conduction’ which gives him the power to travel across great distances in a short span of time through water bodies. With his newfound ability, Hiram pledges to fight the war between the oppressed i.e. enslaved and the oppressor i.e. slavers, and help others escape the confines of slavery. 
The book released in September 2019 garnered numerous accolades which include becoming the #1 New York Times bestseller and getting featured in the’ Oprah’s book club’. 

A Brief Look Inside: 
 
EVERY GOOD BOOK CONTAINS A WORLD FAR DEEPER
than the surface of its pages. The characters and their world come alive, 
and the characters and its world still live on. 
Conversation Starters is peppered with questions designed to
bring us beneath the surface of the page
and invite us into the world that lives on. 
 
These questions can be used to create hours of conversation:
 
• Foster a deeper understanding of the book
• Promote an atmosphere of discussion for groups
• Assist in the study of the book, either individually or corporately
• Explore unseen realms of the book as never seen before
 
Disclaimer: This book you are about to enjoy is an independent resource to supplement the original book, enhancing your experience. If you have not yet purchased a copy of the original book, please do before purchasing this unofficial Conversation Starters.
 
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• Language: English
• Publisher: Daily Books
• Release date: Jan 15, 2020
• ISBN: 9788835360056

Book preview

Answers

Introducing The Water Dancer

The book 'The Water Dancer' is a National Award-winning author, Ta-Nehisi Coates' first attempt at writing a fiction novel. He is also the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship. The book is set in the era before the start of the Civil War in the eighteenth century. During that time, it was a common notion for two groups to exist simultaneously- the oppressors, i.e., white people and the oppressed, i.e., black people. The author has kept this as the central theme of the story he portrays effortlessly.

The protagonist is a young boy, aged nineteen, named Hiram Walker, who was born in a tobacco plantation in antebellum Virginia, known as Lockless. The slaves are known as 'the Tasked' while the plantation owners are known as 'the Quality.' It was a common practice of the wealthy aristocrats to harass the workers. The discipline was frequently dispensed in light of rebellion or possible infractions, and at times misused by the masters to reassert their supremacy. Hiram was a product of a rape by his white master and his black mother. He was an illegitimate son of a Virginia tobacco baron, Howell Walker. Hiram had been very young when his mother was sold off by Howell. Hiram's mother's name was Rose, and she used to be the best dancer in Lockless. Hiram looked up to Thena, an elderly woman, from the plantation. Though Thena was a mother of five children, she was a motherly figure to all the children of the