Olaudah Equiano And The Middle Passage

The Middle Passage was one part of the triangular trade that developed across the Atlantic Ocean. Slaves were involuntarily taken from Africa, loaded onto ships, then brought to the Americas where they were exchanged for goods. The deplorable conditions of such ships often led to revolts and suicides. Olaudah Equiano, a former slave, recounted the horrors of the Middle Passage in his autobiography, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano. Equiano’s harrowing account sheds light on the evils of the Middle Passage, and conveys his condemnation of the passage and the mistreatment of African Americans as a whole.

A growing economy and the gradual normalization of racism didn’t bode well for African Americans like Equiano. White colonists began to view “race-based

slavery as a normal aspect of everyday life” (Shi and Tindall, p. 98). In Equiano’s autobiography, the brutality of his captors is evident in the author’s fear that they were cannibals, the latter of which is reiterated several times throughout, “I asked [some black people about me] if we were not to be eaten by those white men” (Equiano, “Life of Olaudah Equiano”, p. 1 l. 37-38). The forthright tone implies that the fear is not hyperbole: the author truly believed his captors were cruel enough to cannibalize them. It is clear that Equiano’s intended audience included both African Americans and whites who were sympathetic to his anti-slavery message, as he uses his fear of being eaten as an unjustifiable example of evil: it is far more difficult to justify cannibalism than it is to justify slavery. The author establishes his credibility through his eloquence and descriptive explanations of the ship’s condition, “The shrieks of the women, and the groans of the dying, rendered the whole a scene of horror almost inconceivable” (Equiano, p.3 l. 112-114), utilizing pathos to evoke shock and sympathy in potential Abolitionists, who can use such examples as reasons to oppose slavery. He frequently states that death is preferable to the confines of the ship, “death...I began to hope would soon put an end to my miseries” (Equiano, p.3 l. 117-118). Equiano’s autobiography, in itself, is also a celebration of the author’s accomplishment of surviving the Middle Passage: an assertion of the freedom that he purchased for himself.

Most slaves were barred from learning to read and write: Equiano proves that he can do both exceptionally well, while showing humility by acknowledging his own childhood inexperience.

He was only eleven years old when he was captured, reflected in how he thought the ship functioned, “The white men had some spell or magic they put in the water...in order to stop the vessel” (Equiano, p.3 l. 90-91). The belief also signifies how he viewed himself as inherently different from the whites. Despite his age, he was still punished just as severely as the adults. It is a testament to the ruthlessness of his captors, who did not care who they were punishing - man, woman, or child. Equiano cited one instance when his age somewhat played into his favor, when he wasn’t chained by the ankles due to his “extreme youth” (Equiano, p.3 l. 115). Nevertheless, his last observation of families being separated directly condemns slavery. He states it in a calculating manner, “without scruple...relations and friends [are] separated, most of them never to see each other again” (Equiano, p.4 l. 161-162): analyzing how slaves, after seemingly enduring the brunt of mistreatment, have to deal with a difficult

aftermath.
The detrimental effects of the Middle Passage lingered throughout Equiano’s life. He recounted the events of his youth in vivid detail, and while it can be said that time can affect recollection, the author’s message on the injustice of slavery and the Middle Passage still rings true. African Americans would suffer through generations of mistreatment, even long after the dissolution of the Atlantic Slave trade.