Essay On Olaudah Equiano

A Day in The Life Of ……..?

Olaudah Equiano, a Journalist, an activist. He was everything from a slave to an entrepreneur, but we still are not sure where he came from or even how old he truly was. But one thing that is more than evident, he was a self-made man who gained worldwide notoriety on a noble cause to bring attention to abolish slavery. When writing, Equiano’s Travel’s: The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavas Vassa the African, he, for the first time, through the narrative brought to everyone’s attention the appalling situations that slaves were facing. Where the validity in some of the Narrative is in question, there is no question in the result of the extensive work Olaudah did to bring attention to the travesty that resulted from slavery.

When Vincent Carretta, an English professor from the University of Maryland, decided to attack the self-admitted redundant task of writing a biography about someone’s else’s autobiography, little did he know the facts he would discover about the early life of Olaudah. Because of detailed records kept by Olaudah, Carretta was able to track back not only records for the time he served in the Royal Navy, but also the records of his “baptism at St. Margaret’s Church in London. He was surprised that

both gave Olaudah birthplace noted as “Carolina” (Allison, 2006).
This would lead Carretta to search for more discrepancies and inconsistencies in the narrative.

Olaudah’s records contained details such as vessel names, port records, and also newspaper listings. Included were the “voyages of the Ogden and the Nancy skew Equiano’s chronology, as he estimated his arrival in England as 1757” (Allison, 2006). This would make him around seven or eight, instead “as a child of eleven” (Perkins), like documented in the narrative. I think this could attribute to some of the discrepancies. A child of such a young age and going through such a traumatic experience, might not ever know or remember exactly what happened, possibly for his own

good.
After gaining his freedom Olaudah, now after traveling the world and making connections, went to work. “He managed to convince many very important people to pay in advance for his book, a list which starts with the Prince of Wales and includes no less than eight dukes” (Carey). Then he hit the road to promote the book in Scotland, England, Ireland, and Wales. He dedicated his whole life to address slavery. Through his travels, he married, had two daughters, achieved wealth, and respect for this new literary form.
Ultimately, no matter where he was born, how old he was, or if all the experiences detailed in the narrative were experienced by him, or witnessed by him, “He wrote the book to tell the story of all enslaved Africans, not only their suffering but also the possibilities of their lives in freedom. Equiano’s literary genius at telling the story of his life made him “the first successful professional writer of African descent in the English-speaking world” (Allison, 2006). Sometimes the ends do justify the means. So it’s my humble opinion, the significance of his birthplace becomes somewhat insignificant because of the attention that was brought to the injustice that was brought to mankind.