406 Equiano, Olaudah
Equiano includes an elegant frontispiece of himself
as a preface to his Interesting Narrative. Though the
portrait presents Equiano as a European gentleman,
the title page of the book reads, “Olaudah Equiano,
or Gustavus Vassa, the African.” Equiano refers to
himself as “the African” because he knows that skin
color is the standard by which he will be identified
by others. The portrait’s portrayal of Equiano as
both African and European underscores his dual
identity as Olaudah Equiano and Gustavus Vassa.
Gustavus Vassa, the name given to him by his mas-
ter, is the name that Equiano ultimately identifies
with for most of his life. Yet toward the end of his
life, he reclaims his African identity and goes by the
name Equiano.
Equiano repeatedly conveys his loyalty to Brit-
ain, and he praises the good of the British imperial
system throughout his Interesting Narrative. He
considers himself British and does all he can to
deny any difference between himself and others of
British culture. His adoption of British culture is so
convincing that at one pivotal point in the narrative,
a white slave owner tells Equiano that he “talks too
much English.” Despite the accusation, Equiano
does not turn his back on his African heritage.
Instead, he possesses an acute awareness of “race” as
the equivalent of what we would refer to as “culture.”
Equiano considers himself to be British even though
he is of African descent. He chooses to take on the
customs, politics, and religious practices of the Brit-
ish. Throughout the narrative, he is careful not to
seem too radical, and he proposes the adoption of
British customs in African society.
Nonetheless, Equiano is keenly aware of his dual
identity and the boundaries between his African
identity and British acculturation. He realizes that
he will be judged on the basis of his skin color and
not on the basis of the culture he subscribes to. In
a pivotal moment in the Interesting Narrative, he
describes an encounter with a young black boy, who
runs to him and embraces him as if “he had been
his brother” though “they had never seen each other
before.” Though Equiano chooses to live his life as a
British man, he becomes frustrated by the fact that
he continues to be identified by others as an African.
He speaks as both an insider and an outsider of Brit-
ish culture, demonstrating his double consciousness
and discomfort with his marginal identity.
Though Equiano spends a great portion of the
first part of his Interesting Narrative talking about
his African roots, at key moments in the narra-
tive he considers himself white. He even expresses
embarrassment about his skin color. As a result, his
complicated perception of himself both helps and
hinders his abolitionist politics. While he does not
initially condemn slavery altogether, he is critical of
the physical cruelty it engenders. His experiences
of slavery in America and the West Indies are far
worse than the periods when he is enslaved in Africa
or Britain. Equiano has a different attitude toward
slavery than most abolitionists of the time, in fact,
because he opposed the cruelty more than slavery
itself, he might be better called an ameliorationist.
Equiano’s viewpoint of slavery from an economic
perspective conflicts with other popular antislavery
messages. Surprisingly, after becoming free, Equiano
works as an overseer in Central America. Deeply
affected by the immoral behavior associated with the
institution of slavery, however, he eventually quits
and returns to England to promote the antislavery
cause passionately. He becomes actively involved
in a “Back to Africa” movement, the Sierra Leone
project, in order to relocate Britain’s population of
poor black people.
A distinctly African-descended voice sharing
experiences of life in Africa and speaking out against
the slave trade proves to be most credible in persuad-
ing an abolitionist audience in the case of Olaudah
Equiano’s Interesting Narrative. Yet the credibility
of Equiano’s account of his origins in Africa is in
question. The scholar Vincent Carretta’s research
for Equiano, the African: Biography of a Self-Made
Man (2005) indicates that it is highly probable that
Equiano fabricated his African identity and dra-
matic account of surviving the Middle Passage. Car-
retta’s research found baptismal and naval records
suggesting South Carolina to be Equiano’s probable
birthplace. If this is true, then Equiano manufac-
tured the story of his African identity from books he
must have read about Africa, and his account of the
Middle Passage probably comes from oral accounts
of slaves. If Equiano invented his African identity, it
nevertheless became an important factor in the suc-