Olaudah Equiano Publishes “The Interesting Narrative”: The Abolition Debate
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Olaudah Equiano's 1789 memoir "The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa the African, Written by Himself" in its religious mysticism, brings light to the experience of an ensalved person in England, and tells the story of how he freed himself. It was particularly important because it was, written by himself, in his perspective. He lived through the horrors of the transatlantic slave trade, and he turned his life into testimony. The book is political and personal and it mixes Enlightenment ideas with vivid scenes of violence and survival, and he made it impossible for British readers to ignore the reality of slavery. Equiano held up a mirror to the empire to show its flaws.
Greenblatt, Stephen. The Norton Anthology of English Literature. 11th ed., vol. D, W.W. Norton & Company, 2024.