no plagiarism

Name:

ENG 2301

TAKE HOME EXAM 3: The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African. Written by Himself. Vol. I: (15 points)

Instructions:

For your third take home exam, I would like for you to interrogate two key passages from The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano which are highlighted in the attached pages. They are highlighted excerpts from pages 7 and 16 from the memoir. We have discussed these passages often in class. I would like for you to write at least one single spaced page based on each passage ——2 single spaced pages in total which addresses the following topics:

I would like for you critically read, analyze, and examine the important themes conveyed in these passages which include all of the following or additional themes which you think are important to our understanding of the passages and the entire text. You may cover these themes in either response as you wish:

The relationship between skin complexion and intelligence, the suggestion that God created black people in His own image, the horrendous ways in which slavery brutalizes black people, the implications of the passages' claims for examples of how and why whites and blacks should be treated as equals, The role of sympathy in reinforcing equality and its role in convincing whites that blacks are equal, race and religion, the position of blacks as slaves and as property, slavery's role in Reparating families and more.

As you discuss your themes please consider how the author makes the claim, why he makes the claim, and the importance of the claim in challenging the white predominantly slave owning audience to end slavery.

Please feel free to address other key issues such as the form of the appeals and also use quotations from the passages as evidence to back up your claims.

This text must be submitted in class on the extended deadline of Thursday November 21. Because the semester is wrapping up, no extensions will be provided.

4.41 -

Tom

- ION.

they seemed seized with some® -sudden impulse, and ran to and fro unable to stop themselves. At last, after having passed through a number of thorns and prickly bushes unhurt, the corpse fell from them close to a house, and defaced it in the fall; and, the owner being taken up, he immediately confessed the poisoning,

*********

EXAM

PASSAGE

These instances, and a great many more which might be adduced, while they shew how the complexions of the same persons vary in different climates, it is hoped may tend also to remove the prejudice that some conceive against the natives of Africa on account of their colour. Surely the minds of the Spaniards did not change with their complexions!. Are there not causes enough to which the apparent inferiority of an African may be ascribed, without limiting the goodness of God, and supposing he forbore to stamp understanding on certainly his own image, because "carved in ebony." Might it not naturally be ascribed to their situation? When they come among Europeans, they are ignorant of their language, religion, manners, and customs. Are any pains taken to teach them these? Are they treated as men? Does not slavery itself depress the mind, and extinguish all its fire and every noble sentiment? But, above all, what advantages do not a refined people possess over those who are rude and uncultivated. Let the polished and haughty European recollect that his ancestors were once, like the Africans, uncivilized, and even barbarous. Did

inferior to their sons? and should they too have been made slaves? Every rational mind answers, No. Let such reflections as these melt the pride of their superiority into sympathy for the wants and miseries of their sable brethren, and compel them to acknowledge, that understanding is not confined to feature or colour. If, when they look round the world, they feel exultation, let it be tempered with benevolence to others, and gratitude to God, "who hath, made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth; and whose wisdom is not our wisdom, neither are our ways his ways."

* See also Leut. Matthew's Voyage, p. 123.

* An instance of this kind happened at Montserrat in the West Indies in the year 1763. I then belonged to the Charming Sally, Capt. Doran.--The chief mate, Mr. Mansfield, and some of the crew being one day on shore, were present at the burying of a poisoned negro girl. Though they had often heard of the circumstance of the running in such cases, and had even seen il, they imagined it to be a trick of the corpse-bearers. The mate therefore desired two of the sailors to take up the coffin, and carry it to the grove. The sailors, who were all of the same opinion, readily obeyed; but they had scarcely raised it to their shoulders, before they began to run furiously about, quite unable to direct themselves, till, at last, without intention, they came to the hut of hint who had poisoned the girl. The coffin then immediately fell from their shoulder's against the hut, and damaged part of the wall. The owner of the hut was taken into củstody on this, and confessed the poisoning --/ give this story as it was related by the mate and crew on their return to the ship. The credit which is due to it I leave with the reader.

- -

* Acts, c. xvii, v, 26.

We were conducted immediately to the merchant's yard, where we were all pent up together like so many sheep in a fold, without regard to sex or age. As every object was new to me every thing I saw filled me with surprise. What struck me first was that the houses were built with stories, and in every other respect different from those in Africa: but I was still more astonished on seeing people on horseback. I did not know what this could mean; and indeed I thought these people were full of nothing but magical arts. While I was in this astonishment one of my fellow prisoners spoke to a countryman of his about the horses, who said they were the same kind they had in their country. I understood them, though they were from a distant part of Africa, and I thought it odd I had not seen any horses there, but afterwards, when I came to converse with different Africans, I found they had many horses amongst them, and much larger than those I then saw.

EXAM

We were not many days in the merchant's custody before we were sold after their usual manner, which is this:--On a signal given, (as the beat of a drum) the buyers rush at once into the yard where the slaves are confined, and make choice of that parcel they like best. The noise and clamour with which this is attended, and the eagerness visible in the countenances of the buyers, serve not a little to increase the apprehensions of the terrified Africans, who may well be supposed to consider them as the ministers of that destruction to which they think themselves devoted. In this manner, without scruple, are relations and friends separated, most of them never to see each other again. I remember in the vessel in which I was brought over, in the men's apartment, there were several brothers, who, in the sale, were sold in different lots; and it was very moving on this occasion to see and hear their cries at parting. O, ye nominal Christians! might'notan African ask you, learned you this from your God, who says unto you, Do unto all men as you would men should do unto you? Is it not enough that we are torn from our country

and friends to toil for your luxury and lust of gain? Must every tender feeling be likewise sacrificed to your avarice? Are the dearest friends and relations, now rendered more dear by their separation from their kindred, still to be parted from each other, and thus prevented from cheering the gloom of slavery with the small comfort of being together and mingling their sufferings and sorrows? Why are parents to lose their children, brothers their sisters, or husbands their wives? Surely this is a new refinement in cruelty, which, while it has no advantage to atone for it, thus aggravates distress, and adds fresh horrors even to the wretchedness of slavery.

PASS AGE 2

CHAP. III.

I NOW totally lost the small remains of comfort I had enjoyed in conversing with my countrymen; the women too, who used to wash and take care of me, were all gone different ways, and I never saw one of them afterwards.

----

I stayed in this island for a few days, I believe it could not be above a fortnight; when I and some few more slaves, that were not saleable amongst the rest, from very much fretting, were shipped off in a sloop for North America. On the passage we were better treated than when we were coming from Africa, and we had plenty of rice and fat pork. We were landed up a river a good way from the sea, about Virginia county, where we saw few or none of our native Africans, and not one soul who could talk to me. I was a few weeks weeding grass, and gathering stones in a plantation, and at last all my companions were distributed different ways, and only myself was left. I was now exceedingly miserable, and thought myself worse off than any of the rest of my