Comprehensive Study Notes: Olaudah Equiano, Phillis Wheatley, and Enlightenment-Era Anti-Slavery Literature

Early Life, Identity, and Debates Surrounding Olaudah Equiano

  • Debates over early biography and origin:

    • Questions persist regarding whether skepticism of early accounts stems from a lack of documentation, his extensive travels, or racial prejudices against a learned, educated Black man writing his own life story.
    • Skeptics questioned the veracity and morality surrounding his account, despite historical confirmation of American documents claiming birth in America and the undeniable existence of transatlantic slavery.

  • Framing within American and Anglophone Literature:

    • American literature encompasses traveling ideas, language, and narratives across global boundaries.
    • Foundational documents like the Declaration of Independence borrowed linguistic and philosophical frameworks from European traditions and Scottish philosophers.
    • Equiano's writings fit into travel narratives and global literature, bridging Africa, Europe, and the Americas.

  • Cultural attributes and personal background:

    • Equiano worked as a musician and a barber, traveling extensively throughout his life.
    • Expressed a belief that music should be utilized to celebrate all different kinds of occasions.
    • In Chapter 1, he highlights African community life, emphasizing that dance, poetry, and music are essential to nationhood and living a full human experience beyond mere survival or physical non-enslavement.

Nuances of the Slave Trade and Equiano's Position on Abolition

  • Varied conditions of enslavement portrayed in the narrative:

    • Highlights diverse experiences across locations: some slave owners treated enslaved people relatively better, whereas in other places treatments were brutal, involving floggings and throwing individuals overboard during shipboard rebellions.
    • Notes that African people were also involved in facilitating the transportation and trade networks of slavery as part of a broader global economic system.

  • Firm stance on total abolition:

    • Chapter 7 and the narrative's conclusion ("A Case for Abolition") explicitly advocate for the complete eradication of slavery worldwide.
    • Does not condone the institution of slavery or endorse the "benevolent slave owner" myth or white savior tropes.
    • Presents a testimony of witness that accounts for how slavery was justified while exposing its inherent wretchedness.

  • Psychological oscillation between wonder and horror:

    • Navigates complex emotional responses as a young person, oscillating between awe at technological visuals and horror at human suffering.
    • Initial awe at the elaborate construction of slave ships transitions into terror upon witnessing the human devastation contained within.
    • Details horrific realities in Chapter 2, including the severe compression of human bodies below deck and the traumatic separation of families.

Family Separation, Natal Alienation, and Genre Characteristics

  • Traumatic separation from family:

    • Equiano and his sister were torn apart during capture; historical accounts confirm they never met again.
    • Illustrates the concept of natal alienation: the deliberate severance of children from parents at an early age so they grow up without knowing their origin or family ties.

  • Narrative style and genre classification:

    • Uses emotional narrative strategies and imagination to evoke deep emotional responses while accurately recording historical realities.
    • Mirrors Benjamin Franklin's autobiographical approach by writing about himself with explicit humility to avoid appearing vain.
    • Fits into the slave narrative genre, serving as an early precursor to mid-19th-century slave narratives such as those by Frederick Douglass.

  • Biographical timeline:

    • Estimated birth year: circa 1745 (1745 question mark).
    • Death year: 1797.
    • An official portrait painting of Equiano has existed since the 18th century.

Historical Timeline and Revolutionary Context (1776–1789)

  • Key historical milestones surrounding Equiano's narrative:

    • 1776: Adoption of the Declaration of Independence in the United States.
    • 1782: Publication of J. Hector St. John de Crèvecœur's What is an American?.
    • 1783: Treaty of Paris signed, ending the American Revolution; Britain opens the old Northwest to the United States.
    • 1787: US Constitution adopted; Thomas Jefferson writes Notes on the State of Virginia.
    • 1787–1788: Publication of The Federalist Papers.
    • 1789: Publication of The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African. Written by Himself; George Washington elected as the first President of the United States.

  • Global interconnectedness of the Atlantic world:

    • Equiano's narrative sits directly within the American Revolutionary era and its aftermath.
    • Demonstrates how economic and political networks bound Britain, Africa, and the United States together through the system of slavery.

Anglophone Framing, Universal Human Rights, and Enlightenment Connections

  • Lived testimony vs. abstract theory:

    • Equiano provides a detailed, ground-level account of how slavery was maintained and operated, moving beyond theoretical declarations to detail its exact mechanics.
    • Classified as an Anglophone narrative—written in English without strict confinement to a single national canon.

  • Voice and impact on abolitionist literature:

    • Precedes Frederick Douglass as a premier Black voice addressing white readers movingly about the inhumanity of slavery.
    • Engages directly with Enlightenment concepts of liberty, freedom, and equality, pushing them to their limits.
    • In Chapter 7 ("Freedom at Last"), details purchasing his freedom and argues for universal claims to human rights.

  • Archetype of the self-made traveler:

    • Aligns with American literary figures like Christopher Columbus (15th-century traveler) and Benjamin Franklin (18th-century self-made man), charting a trajectory from innocence to experience.
    • The act of writing serves as a powerful instrument of personal agency and complex self-definition.

Post-Emancipation Travels and Ongoing Discrimination

  • Persistent racial discrimination against freed Black individuals:

    • Purchasing freedom did not grant immunity from systemic prejudice.
    • Observed that in Philadelphia—the city of brotherly love—freed Black people were treated with profound contempt, plundered, and universally insulted without legal redress.

  • Global travel and settlement in London:

    • Chose to settle permanently in London after concluding that America was unlivable for freed Black individuals.
    • Mirrors 20th-century African American author James Baldwin, who relocated to Paris, France, to write freely.
    • Traveled extensively to locations including Turkey, an Arctic expedition searching for the Northwest Passage, the Pacific Ocean, Jamaica, and Central America (Honduras and Nicaragua).

Textual Analysis of Equiano's Introduction and Preface

  • Full title:

    • The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African. Written by Himself.

  • Rhetorical strategies of humility in the Introduction:

    • Directly addresses the reader and acknowledges the conventions of the memoir genre.
    • Notes that public taste favors extraordinary memoirs filled with striking events that excite admiration or pity, while ordinary lives are consigned to contempt or oblivion.
    • Confesses it is hazardous for a private, obscure stranger to solicit public attention when offering the history of neither a saint, a hero, nor a tyrant.
    • Considers himself a "particular favorite of heaven" and acknowledges providential mercies when comparing his fate to fellow countrymen.
    • States his primary objective: if the narrative satisfies friends or promotes the interest of humanity in the smallest degree, his heart's wish is fully attained. He seeks to avoid censure rather than solicit praise.
    • Deliberately records scenes of suffering and punishment to incite disgust in the reader, aiming to prevent future atrocities.

Analysis of Chapter 2 Excerpts: Address to Nominal Christians

  • Nostalgia mingled with sorrow:

    • Expresses fondness for early homeland memories while recognizing they are inextricably linked to sorrow.

  • Verbatim analysis of the address to nominal Christians:

    • Employs direct rhetorical questions to expose religious hypocrisy:
    • "Might not an African ask you, learned you this from your God, who says unto you, Do unto all men as you would men should do unto you?"
    • Critiques capitalistic greed and economic exploitation:
    • "Is it not enough that we are torn from our country and friends to toil for your luxury and lust of gain? Must every tender feeling be likewise sacrificed to your avarice?"
    • Denounces the emotional cruelty of family separation:
    • "Are the dearest friends and relations now rendered more dear by their separation from their tender still to be parted from each other and thus prevented from cheering the gloom of slavery with the small comfort of being together and mingling their sufferings and sorrows?"
    • "Why are parents to lose their children, brothers their sisters, their husbands their wives?"
    • Characterizes forced separation as a "new refinement in cruelty" that aggravates distress and adds fresh horror to wretchedness.

  • Shift in narrative voice and scholarly connections:

    • Shifts narrative voice into a sermonistic, scriptural register to expose slaveholders who twist Christian scripture to serve power and profit.
    • Connects to scholar Siddia Hartman's work Scenes of Subjection, which analyzes how Enlightenment thought, subjection, and the calculus of human value operated during the Middle Passage and slavery.

Phillis Wheatley and "On Being Brought from Africa to America" (1773)

  • Context and background:

    • 18th-century enslaved African American female poet writing during the American Revolutionary era.

  • Verbatim text of "On Being Brought from Africa to America" (1773):

    • "'Twas mercy brought me from my pagan land,"
    • "Taught my benighted soul to understand"
    • "That there's a God, that there's a Savior too:"
    • "Once I neither sought nor knew."
    • "Some view our sable race with scornful eye,"
    • "'Their color is a diabolical dye.'"
    • "Remember, Christians, Negroes, black as Cain,"
    • "May be refin'd, and join the angelic train."

  • Literary analysis and double meanings:

    • Literal surface reading: Asserts spiritual equality and Christian salvation, arguing that Black individuals can be refined and join the angelic train.
    • Subversive/Ironic reading: The opening line ("'Twas mercy brought me…") contains deep potential irony when contrasted with the violence of forced abduction.
    • Biblical imagery: Invokes Cain (the biblical figure who murdered his brother Abel) to directly challenge white racial assumptions and demand recognition within Christian spiritual fellowship.
    • Poetic structure: Written in strict European heroic couplets/iambic pentameter, mastering traditional 18th-century neoclassical forms in contrast to later 20th-century free verse movements (such as the Black Arts Movement).

Questions & Discussion

  • Query regarding skepticism of Equiano's early life:

    • Question/Prompt: Was his early life questioned due to lack of records, traveling too much, or racial disbelief regarding an educated Black author?
    • Response: Skepticism stemmed from a combination of all these factors, particularly unstated racial prejudices regarding whether a learned, educated Black man could produce a truthful account of his own life.

  • Query regarding Equiano's sister:

    • Question/Prompt: What happened to Equiano's sister, and did he ever see her again?
    • Response: Historical accounts and narrative context indicate they were separated permanently due to the transatlantic slave trade and never met again.

  • Student observations on Equiano's direct narrative address:

    • Question/Prompt: Why is Equiano's style engaging to readers?
    • Response: Equiano directly addresses the reader with explicit self-awareness, establishing his authority as an author and using memoir conventions to evoke empathy and moral reflection.

  • Student observations on Phillis Wheatley's tone:

    • Question/Prompt: How should the opening lines of Wheatley's poem be interpreted?
    • Response: While surface readings view it as straightforward religious conversion, the phrasing carries double meanings and sarcastic irony regarding forced displacement.