The Slave Trade in British and American Literature - Wilfred D. Samuels (essay date 1985)
Wilfred D. Samuels (essay date 1985)
SOURCE: “Disguised Voice in The Interesting Narrative of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African,” in Black American Literature Forum, Vol. 19, No. 2, Summer 1985, pp. 64-9.
[In the following essay, Samuels contends that Olaudah Equiano's intention in his Narrative, which is to point out the miseries of the slave trade, is enhanced by the use of a disguised voice, through which the author takes control of his audience and holds their attention, outwitting and flattering his white readers while simultaneously revealing that they are unscrupulous and uncaring.]
I.
The author of the slave narrative confronted the difficult task of reporting his lived experiences during slavery to an audience which did not recognize him as a member of its society and, in fact, viewed him “as an alien whose assertion of common humanity and civil rights conflicted with some of its basic...
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