Olaudah Equiano Research Paper

As stated in The Classic Slave Narratives: The Life of Gustavus Vassa, a sense of bewilderment and fright was his first response upon arriving at the coast. "the first object which saluted my eyes when I arrived…a slave ship, these filled me with astonishment, which was soon converted in to terror" (Vassa 57). Comparative to the area Equiano grew up in during his time as a child in Africa, the Europeans were far more technologically advanced, upon seeing ships for the first time he and other slaves agreed that it was magic that drove them due to a lack of understanding. The new world that was emerging around him became hard for him to explain. He and his fellow slaves rationalized the situation by stating that the westerners were spirits and that they possessed magic "there was cloth put upon the…and then the vessel went on; and the white men had some spell or magic they put in the water, when they liked, in order to stop the vessel" (Vassa 59). The traumatizing experience that was boarding a slave ship was almost surreal for Equiano and with his young age so to rationalize the situation he and his fellow slaves concluded that the men handling them could not be human because they were so different. "when I was carried on board. I was immediately handled and… I was now persuaded that I had gotten into a world of bad spirits, and that they were going to kill me"

Throughout the book The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Equiano tries to say that he is just an ordinary person, but this cannot be the case. He survives several ship wrecks, learns to read and write, and is able to buy his freedom. This is far from ordinary and borderlines with extraordinary. As he describes his adventures he starts by telling you a depressing story of how his sister got separated from him. This sets up the reader to know that there is plenty more tragedy to come. This is when he gets thrown into a life of slavery. From there he tries to wiggle his way out from the life of a slave and to create his own. Equiano uses anecdotes that he has experienced to prove to his readers that slavery is cruel and unforgiving, such as the time when he was being transported, to the treatment under his masters, and finally even when he was a free man.

The cruel and harsh treatment of slaves in the seventeenth and eighteenth century is something that in today’s millennium a person could not even dream of. Slaves were known to be illiterate; however there are few that had the opportunity to be educated and from them society has a small glimpse into the past. There are two slaves in particular that give people a way to see life through their eyes. Frederick Douglass and Olaudah Equiano were two slaves during those times that were forced into the world of slavery. Frederick Douglass’s “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass An American Slave” and Olaudah Equiano’s “The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano” are literary pieces that talk about their views, experiences, and ideas in relation to slavery.

Throughout the narrative Olaudah Equiano’s point of view on the white slave traders changes. In the beginning Equiano states “but still i feared I should be put down, the white people looked and acted, as I thought, in a so savage a manner;” (73). Through this quote, Olaudah Equiano shows how he feels towards the slave traders. He explains that he is in fear and confused by both their looks and actions. Olaudah Equiano was still new to the slave trade as he stated his quote. Throughout the narrative Olaudah Equiano creates an intense, nervous mood and tone yet he still incorporates his sense of

Olaudah Equiano is a former African slave that accounts his capture and passage to the New World. He was the son of an African chief in a West African village. He begins his accounts by talking about his family and life in Africa. Equiano describes how he and his sister were kidnapped by African slave traders when he was 11. He was soon separated from his sister and traveled for months till he reaches the Atlantic coast.

Becoming a slave at the age of 11, when he was captured and sold into slavery in the area that is now modern Nigeria, Olaudah Equiano can be considered a pioneer in the abolitionist movement. Most of the information regarding his experiences as a slave and a freeman, along with his thoughts regarding slavery and abolitionism, can be found in his autobiography. In The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African, we find numerous accounts about the atrocities committed against the enslaved Africans. The reader is also able to experience, by participating in the work of the author, in the physical and spiritual transformation of Equiano, from a freeman, to a slave, and back to freedom.

Olaudah Equiano’s journey, although seemingly terrible, may have changed his life for the better. He is sold as a slave at a young age, and remains a slave for several years, until he is able to purchasing his freedom. His experiences shape him into the man he is, and give him credibility when speaking about slavery.

Olaudah Equiano was a slave that documented his whole experience of being a slave, including the gruesome and explicit details of the treatment he received. By the late 18th century, slaves have overcome this cruel and harsh conception. They were given citizenship and freedom

Olaudah Equiano had a first glance of slavery when saw a ship on the coast of a sea. The first thing that entered his mind was fear of being eaten by these scary white men. When he got on the ship he was observed by British men, and right away he felt the bad spirits. He knew they were very different from his African people with long hair, lighter skin, and different languages. When he looked around the ship all he seen was a very large furnace with copper boiling, also with many other blacks chained together. Everyone he saw around him was very sad and scared, so he knew it wasn’t going to end good. Then he got a motionless feeling and fainted. When he woke up, it was nothing but blacks surrounding him; they started talking to him to make

(quizlet.com). Olaudah-Equiano’s previous master treated him with respect and really took care of him, however once he was a slave of the European’s he and all of the other slaves were treated inhumanely. Once Equiano enters this environment, he was immediately terrified because he was not use to the form of treatment he was receiving. In addition, Equiano thought of jumping off the ship, but the slaveholders watched him and others too closely for him to even make an attempt. In that, there are many components that exemplify that Frederick Douglass and Olaudah Equiano were victims of racism that led up to depression.

One of the strongest illustrations of the stressful experience of a slave is The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano. The book was written by Olaudah Equiano who was born in 1745 in a West African village named Eboe. At the age of eleven, Equiano was abducted and sold as a slave. Equiano describes in great detail his voyage along the middle passage towards the Americas and the horrors he witnessed. In the book the narrator not only discusses how savage the voyage was but the long term effects on him after he became a free man. Even after Equiano was able to obtain his freedom he often still had thoughts of

After watching that preview of Equiano experience of a young boy captured by traders and brought to a slave ship. I had to look up in my textbook more about Equiano’s life and the text states that, “Equiano described during the 1780s how horrible it was living around that time. Also, him describing the white slave traders, with their “horrible looks, red faces, and long hair,” appeared to be savages who acted with a “brutal cruelty” that went beyond anything their victims had previously

It is arguable to say that when reading about experiences like Olaudah Equiano that the conditions of slavery, of master and

The long individual story of Olaudah Equiano made the slave-account kind in writing. Equiano was an African American that fell into subjection. He was constrained like numerous other African Americans amid the seventeenth and eighteenth century Equiano takes the manifestation of the otherworldly life account that Saint Augustine utilized as a part of his fifth century religious change work Confessions and adds to its example another measurement that of social dissent. The profound change record takes after a three-section structure in depicting a life of sin, a transformation experience, and the rise of another religious personality. In the short anecdote about Olaudah Equiano, it tells about his life and what he experienced being a slave.

The blacks backed up alittle to give Olaudah some space to breath. He started to feel lonely, all he could think about was returning to Africa or even making it back to shore. Soon the put him on the lower deck, and he smelled a very disgusting smell he never smelled in his life. He started crying because he was sick to his stomach, he wished he was dead. Later on, two British men walked in to feed him, but he refused so now they forced him. The man held his hands, laid him across a windlass, and tied his feet, while the other man beat him severely. Olaudah had never been beaten like that before that moment. After he had seen some people jumping off the dock, thought like that came to his mind, but he could never go through with them. Olaudah