Equiano, the African: Biography of a Self-Made ManThis definitive biography tells the story of the former slave Olaudah Equiano (1745?–1797), who in his day was the English-speaking world’s most renowned person of African descent. Equiano’s greatest legacy is his classic 1789 autobiography, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African, Written by Himself. A key document of the early movement to ban the slave trade, as well as the fundamental text in the genre of the African American slave narrative, it includes the earliest known purported firsthand description by an enslaved victim of the horrific Middle Passage from Africa to the Americas. Equiano, the African is filled with fresh revelations about this many-sided figure. |
From inside the book
Results 1-5 of 60
Page
... English slave traders , who took him on the Middle Passage to the West Indies . Within a few days , he tells us , he was taken to Virginia and sold to a local planter . After about a month in Virginia he was purchased by Michael Henry ...
... English slave traders , who took him on the Middle Passage to the West Indies . Within a few days , he tells us , he was taken to Virginia and sold to a local planter . After about a month in Virginia he was purchased by Michael Henry ...
Page
... English - speaking writers of his age and unquestionably the most accomplished author of African descent . Several modern editions of his autobiography are now available . The literary status of The Interesting Narrative has been ...
... English - speaking writers of his age and unquestionably the most accomplished author of African descent . Several modern editions of his autobiography are now available . The literary status of The Interesting Narrative has been ...
Page 14
... English village offered by Oliver Goldsmith in his poem The Deserted Village ( 1770 ) . Unlike Goldsmith's formerly self - sufficient village , now depopulated and destroyed by the evils of commerce and luxury , however , Equiano's ...
... English village offered by Oliver Goldsmith in his poem The Deserted Village ( 1770 ) . Unlike Goldsmith's formerly self - sufficient village , now depopulated and destroyed by the evils of commerce and luxury , however , Equiano's ...
Page 15
... English preacher Joshua Peel appended the footnote " See the Life of Olaudah Equiano ( afterwards called Gustavus Vassa ) , written by himself ” to the lines Infants are stole , and from their parents torn , As if for wo [ e ] the ...
... English preacher Joshua Peel appended the footnote " See the Life of Olaudah Equiano ( afterwards called Gustavus Vassa ) , written by himself ” to the lines Infants are stole , and from their parents torn , As if for wo [ e ] the ...
Page 22
... English grandmother , Molly Welsh , who arrived in Maryland around 1683 , frequently received pardons on the condition that they would either pay for their own passage to America or go at the expense of merchants , who then sold them as ...
... English grandmother , Molly Welsh , who arrived in Maryland around 1683 , frequently received pardons on the condition that they would either pay for their own passage to America or go at the expense of merchants , who then sold them as ...
Contents
1 | |
17 | |
39 | |
Chapter Four Freedom Denied | 71 |
Chapter Five Bearing Witness | 92 |
Chapter Six Freedom of a Sort | 119 |
Chapter Seven Toward the North Pole | 135 |
Chapter Eight Born Again | 161 |
Chapter Ten The Black Poor | 202 |
Chapter Eleven Turning against the Slave Trade | 236 |
Chapter Twelve Making a Life | 270 |
Chapter Thirteen The Art of the Book | 303 |
Chapter Fourteen A SelfMade Man | 330 |
Notes | 369 |
Bibliography | 395 |
Index | 419 |
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
Abolition abolitionist African British African descent America appeared Atlantic autobiography Benezet Bight of Biafra black poor boat Britain British called captain century Christian Church Clarkson coast colonies command crew Cugoano death deck Eboe edition eighteenth eighteenth-century England English enslaved Africans European Farmer freedom French frontispiece George Granville Sharp Guinea Gustavus Vassa History House of Commons human identity Igbo Ignatius Sancho Indian Interesting Narrative Irving island Jamaica James John King land letter London Lord Mansfield master Middle Passage Montserrat Morning Post Mosquito Mosquito Coast muster list naval Negroes never North Norwich Olaudah Equiano owners Pascal passage Phipps Pitt planters Public Advertiser published Quakers Ramsay readers Royal Navy sailed Sancho seamen servant ship Sierra Leone slavery Society sold soon subscribers Thomas thought tion told transatlantic slave trade Vasa vessel voyage West Indies William writing